This Is Gospel
by smac89
Summary: Darcy Lewis is not a superhero. But that doesn't stop her from trying to save the world anyway. In between wrangling various Avengers, she untangles a centuries-old conspiracy that threatens the safety of the whole universe while simultaneously trying to figure out the wacky powers she seems to keep acquiring. Also there is Loki.
1. Where Will You Be Waking Up Tomorrow

Darcy Lewis was not a superhero. She had never been experimented on by a mad scientist nor bitten by a radioactive whatever. She did not have a secret identity. She had no intention of saving the world, and she absolutely would never, ever wear a cape.

Darcy Lewis was also not human.

Or maybe she was. She wasn't quite sure.

She sure as hell wasn't normal.

Darcy was eight years old when strange things started happening to her. At first it was small things, things no one noticed but her. Like when she was playing outside and suddenly found herself surrounded by hundreds of butterflies all fluttering around her in increasing spirals. Or that any cat, no matter how mean, always purred at her and rubbed against her legs.

(Dogs, however, not so much.)

When Darcy was twelve years old, she started talking in her sleep. According to her three older brothers, it was incomprehensible gibberish, and there was much teasing. Her parents were concerned and consulted a sleep expert, who gave them recording equipment. Darcy watched the videos of herself sleeping over and over, trying to understand what she was saying, to no avail.

The dreams started when Darcy was thirteen, the night she got her first period. She dreamed of a golden chamber with cold floors and a giant in gold armor with a flaming sword. She dreamed she sat on the cold floor, unaffected by the temperature despite her thin pajamas, and talked to the giant for hours in the same strange gibberish she spoke in her sleep. But the trauma of waking up to bloodstained clothing and experiencing menstrual cramps for the first time drove the dream right out of her head the next morning.

And that's when the _really_ weird things started happening.

Darcy always had an umbrella when it rained, even if the forecast said it was clear. She knew the date of every pop quiz at school, and what they were serving for lunch in the cafeteria before it was announced. She knew which cheerleader was secretly dating which football player, and who spraypainted the lockers in the boy's locker room.

And every night her period started, she dreamed of the golden chamber and the golden giant, and each time, the language they spoke became a little more clear.

XxxXxxX

"Darcy. _Psst_. Darcy."

"What?" Darcy asked, exasperated. She looked up from her laptop at her friend sitting across from her.

"Do him," Angela said, pointing at a morose-looking young man using one of the library's public computers.

Darcy sighed and pushed her glasses up her nose, squinting at the man in question. "Sagittarius. Vegan. Smokes pot. Listens to Slipknot. Allergic to dogs." She went back to glaring at the word document on her computer screen, which mocked her with its blank whiteness. She turned her scowl on the stack of textbooks on the table next to the computer.

"I freakin' hate psychology," she muttered. "Why did I take psychology? I'm in poli sci. Poli sci is not even a real science."

"The professor was hot and you needed the science credit," Angela replied, tapping her pen against her notebook. Her attention was not on her notes, as it should have been, but on a well-groomed student reading the school newspaper on the couches nearby. "What about him?"

"Ange, I am not going to find you a boyfriend," Darcy said, digging her own pile of notes out of her backpack.

"Well, what else is your weird mindreader radar skills good for?" Angie asked, leaning back in her chair. "Just do it, okay?"

Darcy pressed her lips together in an annoyed line and looked at the other student over the tops of her glasses. "He's gay," she said abruptly, and went back to her work.

"What's your deal?" Angela asked. "You're usually more fun."

"Maybe. When I don't have six finals to prep for."

" _Please_ ," Angela scoffed. "You have straight A's _and_ extra credit in, like, all your classes. You could bomb all your finals and still pass."

Darcy looked up from her books. "Ange, I love you, but please remember that some of us don't have daddy paying for us to go to Culver. Some of us are here on merit scholarships that we will lose if we get below a C."

Angela looked affronted. "Hey, _I_ get above a C," she protested. Darcy raised an eyebrow and went back to her books. Angela reached over and put her hand on Darcy's arm.

"Darce, will you at least let Cam and me take you out tonight? As a going away party? I mean, you _are_ disappearing off the face of the earth for all of winter break."

"I'm only going to New Mexico," Darcy corrected. "Fine. But only because I don't have class tomorrow."

Angela grinned. "Great! I'll be at your dorm at seven to pick your outfit." She scooped up her backpack and pranced off.

"I don't need you to pick out my outfit," Darcy mumbled after her. She shook her head and turned back to her paper. "I got this," she whispered to herself. She twisted her hair up into a knot and secured it with a pen. "You're my bitch."

XxxXxxX

Darcy woke up in the golden chamber the way she usually did, curled up on her side on the cold floor. She blinked a couple of times and groaned. "Son of a bitch."

"Is the sight of me that unwelcome?" asked a smooth, deep voice off to the side.

Darcy pushed herself into a sitting position. "No. I just realized that I'm going to have period cramps _and_ a hangover when I wake up tomorrow."

The gold-armoured giant raised his eyebrows at her from where he sat on the edge of the dais, his helmet beside him. "Then perhaps you should have not imbibed so deeply. What cause had you to celebrate?"

Darcy was still wearing the clothes she had worn to the bar. With a sigh, she undid the straps of the sky-high platform shoes Angela had convinced her to wear. "My internship that starts next week. Angela and Cameron decided I needed to be sent away 'in style.' Which involved tequila." She made a face. "And strippers. Oh my god. _Why_ was there a stripper?"

The giant gazed at her with eyes the same color as his armor. "I do not think you desire to waste your time here with such facetious questions."

Darcy shook her head violently, feeling her hair come loose from its pins. "No," she agreed. "I have so many more important questions."

"Then let us get the first few out of the way," the giant answered. "My name is Heimdall. No, you will not remember this in the morning, and no, I cannot tell you why."

Darcy blinked a couple of times, feeling put out. "I ask those questions a lot, huh?"

"Every time," the giant confirmed.

Darcy sat cross-legged and propped her elbows on her knees. "Fine. Then can you tell me why on earth I signed up for an astrophysics internship in the middle of New Mexico when I could have taken the internship with Stark Industries PR group?"

"Because you are needed in New Mexico," Heimdall said as if it were obvious.

Darcy growled in frustration. "Why are you _always_ so mysterious? Like, can I get a straight answer for once? I still don't even know what language we are speaking."

"You will know when it is time for you to know," Heimdall told her, and she had the feeling he had told her many times before.

Darcy sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. "Fine. Uh, I had another question. I went home on Thanksgiving break to visit my aunt, 'cause she'd just had a baby, and when I saw the kid for the first time, for a second I just, like, _knew_ everything about him. Like, what he was going to do when he grew up and who he was going to marry and even the names of his kids, but then the next second it was all gone. Just poof." Darcy made an exploding gesture with one hand. "Like, I remember that I knew it, but I can't actually _remember_ it. What's up with that?"

Heimdall nodded wisely. "You are growing stronger. You will recover more of your abilities as you age. Perhaps not in this lifetime, but each death moves you closer to your next birth."

Darcy stared at him. "Wow. Did that actually make sense in your head? Because when you said it out loud it kinda lost its meaning."

"You are different than other humans, Darcy Lewis," Heimdall told her gravely. "You live, you die, you live again. Your body does not remember, but your soul does. And in time, so will you."

"You are so _useless_ ," Darcy groaned. "What even is the point of you bringing me here? You don't answer my questions and I don't even remember any of it."

" _I_ don't bring you here," Heimdall said.

"Then who the hell does?" Darcy burst out. "Why am I like this? Out of everyone on Earth, why do I get hit with all the weirdness?"

"No one _brings_ you here," Heimdall repeated. "You only have yourself to blame, Darcy Lewis."

She stared at him. "Wait. Are you-are you saying I _choose_ to come here?" She pointed at the floor. "Here, specifically. To this specific place?"

Heimdall spread his hands. "I have always been flattered you chose to put your trust in me," he said with a faint smile.

Darcy's eyes got wide. "So...does this mean I could choose to go somewhere else? I mean, other than this room? What other places are there? And where is here?"

Heimdall's smile grew. "As for that, I can show you." He rose to his feet and walked to the center of the dais, where is sword rested in its stand. Taking hold of the hilt, he pushed it downwards, and the walls of the chamber started to spin.

Darcy lunged to her feet, deciding that this was definitely _not_ going to help her hangover, but before she felt like she was going to throw up, the chamber stopped rotating. Heimdall nodded over her shoulder. "Look," he ordered.

She turned around slowly. The wall had disappeared behind her, exposing a vast expanse of stars. There were millions of them, far denser than anything she had seen before, shining bright as diamonds against an expanse of purple and black and green and blue.

"Holy shit," she whispered, unable to catch her breath. She took a step forward, then another. "It's beautiful. Am I-are we in space? Am I on a spaceship?"

"No," Heimdall said with a chuckle. He stepped off the dais to stand beside her, towering over her much smaller frame. "We are at the edge of my world, and this is the bridge to the other Realms."

"Bridge," Darcy repeated, still staring out at the stars.

"Bifrost," Heimdall clarified. "You may read of it on your world. You have legends of it from many ages ago."

"How come you never showed me this before?" Darcy asked.

Heimdall shrugged with the sound of scraping metal. "You never asked."

That brought Darcy out of her shock. She glared up at him. "You are such an asshole."

He nodded in agreement. "You have told me this many times."

Darcy turned to look back at the stars. "Can we do this again? Next time?" she asked hopefully.

"Yes," he said. "As many times as you desire, Darcy Lewis."

Darcy smiled. "Awesome."

XxxXxxX

The airport was a mad scramble as airports were wont to be this close to the holidays. Darcy clutched her bags close as she jostled for room during the rush to get out of the terminal. When she finally did get outside, she realized that her heavy winter coat was entirely too much for the mild desert winter. There was three feet of snow on the ground back home in Pennsylvania, where she had started from that morning.

Standing on the curb, Darcy looked up and down the pick up area. She wasn't sure who was picking her up. She'd emailed her itinerary to the head of the internship but had only received a vague reply from Dr. Foster. She had no idea why she chose this internship over the Stark Industries one. Just another clue that Darcy Lewis had a one-way ticket on the crazy train.

As Darcy did a second scan of the cars lined up at the curb, she noticed an extremely petite woman with brown hair bobbing up and down amongst the crowd as if she was hopping in place trying to see over everyone's heads. Darcy focused on the woman for a moment, amused, and then shocked when she recognized her from the photo on the school website. Darcy forced her way through the crowd with her usual abrupt manner.

"Dr Foster?" Darcy asked when she got closer to the woman. The woman's expression turned from confused concern to relief.

"Hi!" she exclaimed, breathless. "You must be Darcy. I'm Jane. Hi." She thrust her hand out towards Darcy.

"Hi," Darcy replied, shock turning back to amusement. "I must be Darcy. Good to meet you, Dr Foster."

"Call me Jane," the other woman said. "When people call me 'doctor' I expect them to be old men wondering why I need funding. Come on. I had to park the van around the corner."

Jane turned out to be pretty speedy despite her height, and Darcy had to struggle to keep up with her while carrying enough luggage to last her four months. She didn't feel bitter about Jane not helping her, the poor woman looked barely able to carry a purse, much less one of Darcy's overstuffed duffel bags. She wondered when the last time Jane had had something to eat.

"The van" turned out to be a tank-like monstrosity that barely fit in the parking lane and, when Jane opened the side door so Darcy could throw her bags in, was nearly packed full of monitoring equipment. "Wow," Darcy said as she carefully slid her bags into the meager empty space. "I had no idea astrophysics needed so much stuff."

"Most of it I made myself," Jane told her brightly. "It's pretty user-friendly. You'll pick it up in no time."

"Yeah...I don't think that's a good idea," Darcy said, deflating, but Jane had already circled around to the driver's side and didn't hear her. Darcy had to pull herself up into the passenger seat. Perhaps Jane had a stepladder on the driver's side. Seriously, this lady was _tiny_.

"So we're mainly working out of Puente Antiguo but I've had to drive two or three hours into the desert a few nights, so we have to be pretty mobile," Jane explained as she pulled her beast of a vehicle away from the curb. "We do have a fully functional lab with remote access to Culver databases and computing engines, so that's cool!"

"Uh-huh," Darcy said non-committedly, wondering when would be the right time to admit she was just in poli sci.

"I don't know how much they told you, but what I really need right now is data entry and graphing, logistics, site mapping, pretty basic stuff."

Darcy relaxed a little. "Oh, okay. That's cool. I can do that."

"I gotta ask you, though. I saw your major was political science. Why did you apply for this internship?"

Darcy smiled weakly. "Change of scenery?" she suggested. _Because I'm needed here_ , she didn't add, because that was way too far out and besides, who says that sort of crap?

Jane gave her a sidelong look. "Yeah, I can imagine you'd wanna get out of Virginia during the winter but I should warn you, it gets cold in the desert at night. You'll want that big jacket you're wearing."

"Fantastic," Darcy said, because she loved the cold. The colder the better. She loved breath-cloud, red-nose, numb-cheek cold in a way poor Bube Rosa, who lost three toes to frostbite during the war, said was disgraceful.

"It's about three hours to Puente Antiguo from here, so we should probably stop somewhere and get you something to eat," Jane said. "I know this really good barbecue place. They make a mean pulled pork."

"Nah, I'm good," Darcy said, even though her stomach was growling.

"Are you sure?" Jane asked, looking at her with a frown. "It's a long flight from Pennsylvania. I'm sure you're starving."

"Yeah, it's just...I'm Jewish," Darcy replied lamely.

"Oh!" Jane's face lit up. "I know this place with _amazing_ knishes. It's on the way!"

Darcy decided then and there she was going to like Jane Foster.

XxxXxxX

Darcy sat with her legs hanging off the edge of the golden room, watching the stars wheel by between the toes of her fuzzy socks. "This is such bull," she said out loud. "I've been there for a month, and nobody needs me yet."

"Patience, child," Heimdall said. He sat next to her, starlight glinting from his armor. "The stars turn as they will. You cannot rush them."

Darcy let her head fall back. "You are _such_ a pain in my ass. I don't even know why I come here anymore."

"It is because you are still searching," Heimdall told her. "When you have found yourself, you will know your way."

Darcy turned to look at him, exasperated. "You totally stole that from a fortune cookie."

He raised an eyebrow. "How do you know they did not steal this from me?"

"Whatever," Darcy said, waving a hand at him. "I mean, Jane's great. All I gotta do is feed her, water her, and point her in the right direction and she just takes care of herself. I like driving the monster. She lets me drive the monster."

"I assume you refer to the motor conveyance?"

"Car. It's called a car. Dude. What century are you from?"

"I was born before your people even invented the wheel, Darcy Lewis," Heimdall admonished her gently.

" _My_ people?" Darcy echoed. She stared hard at Heimdall. "So...you're not human?"

"Neither are you," Heimdall pointed you. "But they are your people, nonetheless."

Darcy sighed hard. "You are cryptic as _fuck_ , bro."

Heimdall nodded sagely in agreement.

XxxXxxX

The first thing Darcy thought when she laid eyes on Dr Selvig was, _alright now shit's gonna start happening._ Which was crazy because Dr Selvig was everything Darcy ever wanted in a kindly uncle figure and was the exact opposite of the definition of "happening." But Darcy knew better than to doubt her gut feeling because they were always, _always,_ right.

But for the first few hours after Dr Selvig's arrival, he and Jane just talked science to each other and calibrated their equipment while Darcy downloaded songs onto her iPod. Hey, it was a long drive into the desert and she wasn't distracted by blinky lights in the sky.

When they were finally ready to head out into the desert to observe Jane's "celestial event," Darcy agreed to drive with the one caveat that they eat before they left. Jane knew every good restaurant in a thirty-mile radius but she would forget to eat for three days if Darcy let her.

One of Darcy's many duties that was _not_ in the job description was make sure that Jane got regular meals. And, since this was America, very few of the places that delivered were Kosher, so Darcy, as usual, was forced to do most of their cooking. Which meant all those years forced to hang on to Bube Rosa's apron strings were finally paying off.

She'd made salmon with lemon dill sauce because Dr Selvig was from Sweden, and didn't they eat a lot of salmon in Sweden? Darcy had heard of rumors of fermented fish but she couldn't remember which Scandinavian country it came from. Of course, neither Jane nor Dr Selvig even tasted their food as they were too busy sciencing as they wolfed it down.

"Philistines," Darcy muttered to herself.

Darcy played her new songs over the monster's radio during the drive out to the desert and sang quietly along while Jane and Dr Selvig prepared the equipment in the back. After a little while Dr Selvig stopped to listen and Darcy trailed off, embarrassed.

"No, no, I am sorry," Dr Selvig said, looking equally embarrassed. "I simply had no idea you spoke such good Norwegian."

Darcy stared at him. "I...don't," she said slowly, eyes wide.

"Oh." Dr Selvig's embarrassment grew. "I'm sorry. I thought I heard...ah, never mind. I'm certain sometimes I'm going deaf. It's nothing."

Darcy nodded uneasily and turned her attention back to the desert. _Holy crap_ , she thought to herself. _Was I speaking Norwegian? Since when do I know Norwegian?_ She made a face. _And why the hell_ Norwegian _?_

They waited at the site for over two hours. Darcy had seen Jane's event already, like, four times, and wasn't really interested in seeing it again. Instead she googled Norwegian language on her phone (who knew you could still get 4g in the middle of the desert) and found, to her surprise, that yes, she did know Norwegian.

What the actual fuck.

"Can I turn on the radio?" she asked Jane as she put her phone down, hands shaking. The music would help her get over the shock.

"No," Jane replied shortly.

Darcy took a few deep breaths and stared out the windshield, trying to calm herself down again. It was okay. She could handle weird. She'd been handling weird her whole life.

Speaking of weird... "Jane," Darcy called uneasily. "You really need to see this!"

Jane and Selvig both dropped back into the van and leaned over the driver seat. "I thought you said it was a subtle aurora," Selvig said.

"Drive!" Jane commanded.

Drive. Yeah. Drive right into the rainbow tornado of doom. Darcy hated her life sometimes. Especially when bossy scientists tried to grab the wheel away from her and then _hit someone with the bloody monster_.

"Technically that was your fault!" Darcy yelled at Jane as she stumbled out of the van.

"Get the first aid kit!" Jane yelled back.

Darcy turned to obey when she caught sight of the man they'd hit. "Whoa. Does he need CPR?" she asked. "Because I totally know CPR." He was hot. Like, lumberjack-live-off-the-land hot. Before they could assess any injuries, the man climbed to his feet and started yelling at the sky. Darcy only caught a few words, but she distinctly heard him say "Heimdall" and "Bifrost."

She knew those words. She _knew_ those words. She recognized them on a level so deep she could feel her whole body vibrate with the knowledge, and it freaked her out. She panicked, and did the only thing she could think of.

She tased the guy.

XxxXxxX

When Darcy woke up to a starry sky and the sound of waves, with the gold-armored giant standing over her, she instantly jumped to her feet.

"This is Asgard!" she yelled excitedly. "Holy shit, I'm in Asgard. You're Heimdall. I _remember_! This is incredible! I am not, actually, crazy! This is a real place. You're a real person. Oh, my God, wait until Jane hears about this! Where is Thor? I need to talk to him, like, right now." She looked around and realized that she was not, in fact, inside the golden room. "Where are we?"

Heimdall nodded over her shoulder. She whirled around. They were outside, standing on a wide bridge of some kind of rainbow-colored crystal. A few meters behind Darcy, the bridge ended in a shattered, jagged edge, beyond which was only empty space and stars.

"The Bifrost has been destroyed," Heimdall told her.

"Bifrost," Darcy repeated. "That's how Thor came to earth, right?"

"Yes," Heimdall confirmed.

"So...Thor can't come back, can he?" Darcy asked, her mood falling.

"No," Heimdall replied.

"Oh," Darcy said in a small voice. "Jane is not going to be happy." She heaved a deep sigh. "What happened?"

"Loki tried to use the Bifrost to destroy Jotunheim," Heimdall explained. "Thor was forced to destroy it to stop him."

"What happened to Loki?" Darcy asked, scowling. "Because he totally tried to kill us back on earth."

"Loki was lost," Heimdall said gravely. "The royal family is in mourning."

"Why?" Darcy demanded. "He sounds like a dick."

"He was still the king's son," Heimdall said firmly. "And he was Thor's brother. Whatever happened between them, that did not change."

"I guess," Darcy said, shuffling her feet. She sighed again. "Great. So now I have to tell Jane that Thor isn't coming back anytime soon. She's gonna be devastated."

"Telling her this would reveal your gift to her," Heimdall pointed out. "Are you ready for such exposure?"

Darcy thought about this for a long time. "No," she finally decided. "I don't even know what's going on with me. I can't try to explain this to someone else." She looked up at Heimdall. "I still want to talk to Thor."

"The royal family is in seclusion," Heimdall told her. "Soon there will be no time for mourning, so they must take what little time they have."

"Okay," Darcy said unhappily. "But now that I know who you are and where this is, are you going to give me some straight answers now?"

"The language we speak is what your people call ancient Norse," Heimdall said. "We call it the First Tongue, which we spoke before Allspeak."

"Fantastic," Darcy said sarcastically. "Somehow I learned ancient Norse in my dreams. Great. Why?"

"I see only the present, Darcy Lewis," Heimdall told her. "Your future is shrouded from me. But know this, whatever the future holds for you, it will decide the fates of both earth and Asgard."

"So no pressure, then," Darcy said, crossing her arms and hugging herself.

XxxXxxX

Over the next three months, Jane was obsessed with searching for some kind of connection with Asgard. Darcy didn't have the heart to tell her that it was hopeless, or that her internship was rapidly coming to an end. In fact, a week before the internship was over, Jane still hadn't mentioned the fact that Darcy was leaving. Jane was making plans months out and made it clear Darcy was part of them.

So Darcy called her parents and told them she wasn't coming home for a while, and then called her counselor at Culver and switched to online classes.

In her copious free time (read: not much), Darcy went into her own research mode. She read everything she could find on Asgardian culture, lore, and myth. When she dream-traveled to Asgard the next time, she asked Heimdall to take her into the city, to the nearest library. It was huge. Like, the entire Culver campus could fit inside the building. And, of course, she could only visit it once every twenty-eight days.

Until the day she dream-traveled twice in a row. It was five months after Thor had left and Jane was starting to lose momentum. Darcy had more time for her own projects but was similarly getting nowhere. Her eight hour trip to the Asgardian library had once again ended in failure. But when she went to sleep the next night, she woke up curled in one of the ridiculously comfortable chairs in the library.

"Holy crap," Darcy whispered, looking around. Heimdall was nowhere to be seen. He met her here, in the same place every month, with an Asgardian robe to cover her earth clothing. Darcy sat perfectly still, unsure of what to do next. She slowly got up and looked around again. There was nobody in this section of the library, which was a mercy, because she was wearing sweatpants and a My Neighbor Totoro t-shirt. As usual, it was chilly in the cavernous building but, also as usual, Darcy wasn't bothered.

Darcy set off on bare feet toward the tiny corner of the library dedicated towards Midgard and all things earth. It might take up only a fraction of the library, but there were still thousands of books she had yet to even touch.

Most of the books were written in Allspeak, which was a little disorienting at first, but a few were written in ancient Norse. Those were the books Darcy gravitated to first. She felt a connection with the language for a reason she couldn't explain. She chose a book that looked fairly promising and sat on the floor to read.

"Hello, child," said a female voice.

Darcy gave a little scream and dropped the book, scrambling backwards until her back hit the shelf. A woman stood over her, tall and regal with elaborately coiffed blonde hair and wearing a blue gown. She was not young, but still beautiful, the weight of wisdom in her smooth face.

At Darcy's startled reaction, the woman held up her hands in a peaceful gesture. "My apologies. I did not realize how enraptured you were in your book."

Darcy shoved to her feet, back still against the bookshelf. "I'm allowed to be here," she blurted. "Heimdall said it was okay."

"I do not doubt that," the woman assured Darcy. "I did not intend to challenge you. I simply have not seen you here before, and this is one of my domains."

"Oh," Darcy said. She wrung her hands together, desperately wishing she was wearing something other than her pajamas. "I'm Darcy Lewis."

"You are human?" the woman asked, tilting her head curiously.

"Yeah," Darcy replied, wondering how much she should tell this person.

"Interesting," the woman murmured. She extended her hand cordially. "I am Lady Frigga. It is a pleasure to meet you, Darcy Lewis."

Darcy took the proffered hand. "Same," she said.

"How did you come to be here, Darcy Lewis?" Frigga asked, releasing her hold on Darcy. "Our realm is closed to travellers at this time."

"Because Thor destroyed the Bifrost, yeah, I heard," Darcy said. She bobbed her head and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "It's...kind of a long story."

Frigga smiled encouragingly. "I have time to hear it, if you are willing."

Darcy hesitated again. This woman was a total stranger, but something about her felt right. Darcy's gut instinct was to trust Frigga, and Darcy's gut was usually right. So she shrugged and went with it.

"I come here in my sleep," Darcy told her. "Uh, like astral projection? Sort of dream traveling, I don't know. I've done it since I was a kid."

Frigga nodded knowingly. "You are a dream-walker. Yes, I know of this. And you speak the First Tongue. Tell me, Darcy Lewis, are you certain you are human?"

Darcy shrugged again with a humorless laugh. "To be honest, I don't even know anymore. With all the weird crap I can do, it makes me seriously wonder."

Frigga studied Darcy for a long moment, and then gestured toward the girl. "Follow me," she ordered. Darcy blinked a couple of times, but then fell into step behind the taller woman as she led her through the stacks.

It took them a while to get to the other side of the library, and Frigga gave no hint of where she was leading Darcy. But again, Darcy's instincts were telling her she was in no danger. Frigga entered the stacks again and paced slowly along the shelves, running her fingers along the spines of the books.

"Here," she said at length. "Perhaps this one will have what you seek." She pulled a book from the shelf and handed it to Darcy. It was heavy, the cover embossed in gold and scarlet, runes carved in circles on the front.

"Thanks?" Darcy said uncertainly.

"The library is at your service for as long as you should need," Frigga told her. "May your search be fruitful." With that, she swept off with a grace that Darcy could only envy, and never imitate. With a sigh, Darcy sat cross-legged on the floor and opened the book. She read for a few minutes before looking up in confusion.

"What the hell is a norn?"


	2. Just A Taste Of What You Paid For

Darcy wouldn't say she was _actively_ avoiding Heimdall, but yes, she was avoiding Heimdall. Had been for the last few months. She hadn't told him that she was now visiting Asgard three or four days a month, depending on how long her period lasted (and ew, why did it have to be dependent on _that_ of all things?). She hadn't told him she was pretty sure she knew what she was. She hadn't told him that she was now pushing the limit of her powers just to see how far she could go.

She was willing to admit that yes, she was a little bitter. After all, Heimdall had known what she was for years and never told her. It would have taken him two seconds to end a lifetime of searching for answers. But no, he had to be Mr. Mysterious and Cryptic, as usual.

So yeah, Darcy was avoiding Heimdall.

So instead of hanging out with him at the Bifrost, Darcy spent most of her time in Asgard either in the library, or in the city, blending in with the crowds of people and exploring.

Asgard was amazing. Like, mind-blowingly amazing. Darcy saw things that half the time she didn't even understand. She had moments of guilt, thinking about Jane and how much Jane would love it here, but then she would imagine the look of horror and betrayal that would surely be on Jane's face if Darcy ever told her the truth, and then Darcy didn't feel guilty anymore.

It had been almost a year since Thor had crash-landed in the desert and Jane had more or less given up looking for him. Darcy didn't try to encourage her to keep going, as she knew it was pointless. The Bifrost still hadn't been repaired, and Darcy herself hadn't even tried to contact Thor. She'd thought about it, and then decided she wasn't ready to tell Thor the truth, either. She wanted to wait until she had a better handle on the whole thing.

After all, she didn't have a whole lot of information on norns.

As far as she could tell, norns were ancient Norse goddesses, enforcers of fate and protectors of Yggdrasil, the world tree. They were also giantesses and most definitely not human. Darcy had no idea how she fit into the picture, but the list of powers the norns had kinda sorta matched the things that she could do.

But the thought that she could be a Norse goddesses was beyond ridiculous. Come on, seriously. She was _Jewish_.

So for the moment, Darcy set that possibility aside and instead just focused on getting a better handle on her powers.

She could still predict the weather with startling accuracy. The whole cat-whisperer thing was kinda cool, a little creepy. Those critters literally came out of _nowhere_ to say hello to her. And it was a constant thing. Even Jane started to notice it. The butterfly summoning wasn't really an issue in New Mexico, where there were no butterflies, but she had done it at least three times in Asgard without meaning to. The ability to read people, though, that's where she struggled the most.

It was hit or miss, really. Sometimes she saw people with perfect clarity, and other times she got absolutely nothing. Jane, for instance, remained stubbornly un-readable, no matter how hard Darcy tried (and boy, did she try). Erik, however, was an open book, on the rare occasion he came around for a visit. Darcy always had this feeling that weird shit was going to happen whenever Erik was around, and she was usually right.

Darcy liked to practice on Asgardians when she was in the city. She'd taken a robe from the palace and hid it in the library to use on her visits, so people didn't stare at her like a fish out of water. Most Asgardians didn't even notice her, which was okay in her book, until someone tried to run her over. Seriously, all of them were so freakin' tall. Darcy wasn't terribly petite (not like Jane) but the Asgardians towered over her to a ridiculous fashion.

When the man came to offer Jane a job at the observatory in Norway, Darcy knew something was up. She could smell SHIELD all over the man, but when she tried to warn Jane, there was only so much she could say without giving herself away.

"Private jet, Darcy," Jane said.

So they packed up their equipment and headed off to Norway. Hey, at least Darcy spoke the language, right?

There was an apartment waiting for them in Oslo, and after a twelve hour flight, Darcy was ready to crash. So she was not thrilled to wake up standing on the sidewalk in...New York?

"What the hell?" Darcy muttered, turning around in place. She had never dream-walked anywhere except Asgard before. "I'm not even on my period," she whispered to herself.

The people around her were staring up at the sky and pointing, talking excitedly and yelling. Darcy turned around and her mouth fell open. There was a hole in the sky and there were things pouring out of it, things that swooped and skittered over the buildings.

Then the explosions started.

Darcy's first instinct was to run for cover but as she bolted for the nearest building, she had a horrible, sick feeling in her stomach that forced her to a stop in the middle of the street. Other people ran past her, screaming in terror.

"No!" Darcy yelled at them. "Don't go in there!"

One of the flying things tore past overhead, too fast for Darcy to see, and the side of the building exploded, raining debris down on the people trying to take cover. Most of them were crushed by the rubble.

Darcy pressed her hands to her mouth to hold back a scream of horror. She spun around and realized she was standing in the middle of a long, straight street and there were more of the flying things headed straight for her.

They looked kind of like jetskis, she thought, staring at the crafts bearing down on her. Bolts of energy sizzled through the air and slammed into cars with explosive force. Darcy took a deep breath and held it.

The sounds of chaos around her suddenly went dim and muffled, replaced by a high, crystalline ringing. The attackers became clear and sharp as broken glass while everything else was blurred. Darcy saw the attackers, saw their path, the angle of their attack, the line of their fire.

She saw everything.

She stepped to the side a moment before an energy beam blasted past her, but she didn't flinch, nor did she react at the explosion behind her. She knew what she had to do, and she knew how to do it.

Darcy grabbed the first person who ran past her. "You have to get underground!" she yelled over the ringing in her ears. She pointed to the nearest subway entrance. "Get everyone you can and get them underground!"

She didn't wait to see if her orders were followed. She took off running down the street, weaving in a seemingly random pattern that somehow managed to avoid all of the falling debris.

A shadow darkened the sky overhead and she looked up again. A vast creature swam through the sky as if through the deepest ocean, graceful despite its impossible size and complete disregard for the laws of gravity.

Figures were repelling off the giant creature and landing on the ground and buildings, figures most definitely not human. Darcy pushed that realization aside and kept running. One of the creatures (aliens?) landed near her and leveled his weapon at her. Darcy dropped into a slide to let the energy pulses pass over her and pushed back to her feet.

She reached an underpass where a dozen or so people were huddled under the bridge, crying in fear. Darcy crouched next to them and scanned the sky.

"Okay, here's the play," she said, slightly winded. "There's gonna be a gap in twenty-four seconds. You're gonna make a break for that building and use the basement to get into the subway tunnels. You go down as far as you can and you stay there, got it?"

Darcy looked around at the people, who were staring at her as if she was insane. "Hey!" she yelled at them. "Look alive, people! We've gotta move!" She checked the sky again. "All right, go! Go now!"

When no one budged, Darcy dragged the nearest person to their feet and pushed them towards the building in question. "Move!" she ordered again. She managed to get the others on their feet and heading in the right direction. She followed them to the doors of the building and looked back.

The underpass dissolved into a fireball with enough force to send concrete through the windows of the surrounding buildings. If they had stayed there, no one would have survived.

Darcy took another deep breath and held it, letting the world sharpen into focus. The people in the building behind her were safe now. She had to keep moving.

There was a school bus on its side across the street from her. Darcy mapped a path through the energy pulses and explosions and darted across as fast as her stockinged feet would carry her.

The kids inside the bus were too scared to scream. The bus driver was clearly dead and two of the kids were too injured to move. Darcy picked up one of them and handed her to the biggest student. Then she picked the second one up and cradled him to her chest.

"When I say, you follow me, okay?" she told the kids. "You got that? Follow me."

Darcy kicked out the emergency exit and clambered out of the bus into the street. "Come on!" she yelled at the kids. "Let's go!"

They filed out after her as she led them around the corner and down the stairs into a subway station. Once they were far enough down the track, Darcy put down the child in her arms and turned to the oldest kid.

"Stay here until an adult comes for you, okay?" She waited until got an affirmative before heading back to street level.

The city was in absolute chaos. Explosions were going off everywhere and people were running in all directions. Darcy choked on bile forcing itself up her throat as she realized she knew the exact second each one of them would die. She had to do something to stop it, stop them all from dying, but for the life of her she couldn't figure out how.

She stood in the middle of the street, confident that she wasn't in danger at the moment, and focused all of her attention on the portal high over head, trying to glean every bit of information her powers could give her. It was all garbled and unintelligible, like listening to the radio in a different language.

A blur of blue and red landed next to her and a strong grip spun her out of the way of an energy blast that would have missed her by two inches. She pulled free of the grip and looked her new companion up and down. He was wearing an extremely well-tailored outfit of red, white, and blue, including a helmet that partially obscured his face, and a round metal shield, which she instantly recognized.

"Seriously?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. "Who the fuck are you supposed to be?"

The man faltered for a moment, caught off-guard by her question. "I'm...I'm, uh, Captain America."

It was Darcy's turn to blink at him, nonplussed. "Seriously?" she asked again. Before he could reply, she grabbed his wrist and forced his shield up to catch another energy blast that knocked them back a couple of steps. "Look, whoever you are, this really isn't the best time for making a target of yourself," Darcy said, dropping his arm.

"You're one to talk," the man snapped. "You need to get out of the street, get to cover."

"There are people who are going to die," Darcy protested. "I can save them."

"You are going to get yourself killed," the man said sharply, and grabbed her arm again to drag her out of the street.

Darcy had only a half second's warning, not enough time to go for the shield again, so instead she pushed the man out of the way and spun around, just as the blast impacted her chest.

She woke up with a gasp, jerking upright and clawing at her chest. Her shirt was uncharred, her skin unblemished, but her ribs hurt like a son of a bitch. She flung the covers off and went to find Jane. Her friend was in the living room, huddled under a blanket on the couch, eyes fixed on the television.

The news was playing in Norwegian, which of course Darcy didn't have a problem understanding, but she would have recognized the event regardless. Darcy shuffled into the room. "Jane?" she whispered.

Jane startled and craned her head back to look at Darcy. "I called for you," she said in a thick voice. "You were asleep."

Darcy circle the couch and sat next to Jane, who unfolded enough to glom onto Darcy with a faint sob. Darcy clung to Jane just as hard, unable to tear her eyes away from the screen. "It's okay," Darcy murmured, stroking Jane's hair. "I don't know how, but it's gonna be okay."

Jane sniffed, swiping her face with the blanket. "Thor is there," she said, pointing at the tv. Darcy took a second look to confirm that she was right. _How the hell had he gotten there?_ _The bifrost was still inoperable._ She said nothing out loud and just held Jane tighter.

XxxXxxX

Darcy marched down the rainbow path, her borrowed robes fluttering around her in the salty wind. She made a beeline towards the golden-armored figure standing at the jagged edge of the bridge. She stopped several yards away and planted her hands on her hips. Heimdall didn't turn around.

"What," Darcy said flatly. "The fuck. Is going on?"

"I presume you mean the incident in New York City," Heimdall replied evenly.

"You presume correctly," Darcy said icily.

"Loki brought an army to Midgard in an attempt to conquer your world. It appears he was after an artifact held by your people."

"Loki," Darcy echoed, crossing her arms. "Great. You know this is the second time I have almost died because of that bastard."

"I do not dispute this," Heimdall said, slowly turning around. "But not everything is as it seems, Darcy Lewis. You of all people should know that."

"Yeah," Darcy replied, drawing the word out. "You mean like me. Since I'm, you know, a _norn_. Nice of you to let me know, by the way."

"And if I had told you what you truly are, would you have pushed yourself so hard to focus your powers?" Heimdall challenged.

Darcy shook her head, nowhere near mollified. "I visited you for _years,_ Heimdall. I trusted you. I _relied_ on you. And the biggest thing in my life is the thing that you've been keeping from me."

"And I will not apologize for it," Heimdall replied, resting his hands on the hilt of his sword. "I had a reason for everything I did, Darcy Lewis. Remember that you are very, very young, and I am not. I see things that you cannot. Not yet."

"I want to understand what is going on," Darcy insisted. "I _need_ to understand."

Heimdall studied her for a long moment. Darcy raised her chin and squared her shoulders, determined not to bow under the weight of his stare.

"I cannot give you the answers you seek," Heimdall said at length. Darcy opened her mouth to protest but Heimdall silenced her with a look. "I cannot, because it is not my place to do so. This is a journey you must make alone."

Darcy took a deep breath to settle her impulsive burst of annoyance. "You suck," she said at length.

"You may have mentioned this before," Heimdall said with a sagely nod.

Darcy took a second, unsteady breath. "...And I could really use a hug," she added, her voice breaking.

Heimdall sheathed his sword with one smooth motion and reached her side in two steps. "Are you unwell?" he asked gently.

Darcy sniffed loudly to hold back tears and looked up at him. "I was there," she told him. "And I saw so many people die. I _felt_ them die, all of them, felt their pain and fear and…" she shuddered. "And it feels as if something is broken inside me."

Heimdall reached up and unbuckled his breastplate. He set it aside and did the same with his pauldrons, and his shoulder plates. Once he'd removed all the armor from his upper body, he enveloped Darcy in a bear hug. It was the best hug Darcy had ever been given in her whole life. She closed her eyes and hugged him back as tears leaked down her cheeks. Heimdall smelled like sandalwood and spices, and she had never felt more protected.

Heimdall hugged her until Darcy no longer felt like her chest was full of broken glass, only releasing her when she made the first move to pull away. "Thank you," she said, and this time her voice broke out of relief, not sorrow.

"You are stronger than you know, Darcy Lewis," Heimdall told her, staring into her eyes.

"You can just call me Darcy," she told him with a small smile.

He smiled back. "I would rather call you by your true name."

Darcy raised an eyebrow. "And what's that?"

He straightened to his full height. "Sigyn," he told her. He reached out and touched her forehead. "Sleep well, little norn."

Darcy slept the rest of the night and did not dream.

XxxXxxX

Jane was passed out on the couch, from where she had not moved in almost two days, watching the news coverage of the attack on New York. Darcy was sending another email to Dr Selvig. He'd been working with SHIELD for the last few months; maybe he had some news on Thor. Normally Darcy would just pop over to Asgard and ask Heimdall herself, but since her last visit she'd been unable to dream-walk. She suspected Heimdall had something to do with it, which was why she wasn't worried.

A sharp knock on the front door of the apartment startled her and she checked her watch. It was six in the morning, and they weren't expected at the observatory today. Darcy got up from the kitchen table and shuffled over to the door. She checked through the peephole and sighed.

It was one of the SHIELD agents from New Mexico. She really should have seen this coming. She unlocked the door and yanked it open. "What?" she demanded, glaring at the agent.

He looked taken aback at her aggression and it took him a moment to reply. "I'm here to speak with Dr Foster."

"She's unavailable," Darcy said. "I'll take a message."

"It's about her colleague, Dr Selvig," the agent explained.

Darcy's stomach dropped. "Is Erik okay?" she demanded, her grip tightening on the doorknob.

"I'm here to speak with Dr Foster," the agent repeated firmly.

Darcy narrowed her eyes. "Agent...Sitwell, right? Let me remind you that I am not just Dr Foster's intern, I am her personal assistant, caretaker, and friend. I have full access to all parts of her work, including her work for SHIELD. Let me further remind you that I am one of the few people who knows what really happened in New Mexico and SHIELD _really_ wants me to keep my mouth shut, but can't actually do anything to me if I don't, given that Thor will probably kick all of your asses if anything happens to me, or by extension, Jane. Also, I tased Thor. And if I'm willing to do that to a Norse god, just imagine what I'd be willing to do to your scrawny human ass."

She crossed her arms and glared at Sitwell. "So let me ask you again. Is Erik okay?"

Sitwell stared at her for a couple of seconds. "Dr Selvig is currently being hospitalized for injuries he sustained during the incident in New York."

"Oh, my god," Darcy whispered. She turned around and walked back into the apartment, going straight to the couch and shaking Jane awake. "Jane. Jane, wake up. SHIELD is here. Something happened to Erik."

"What?" Jane mumbled blearily, rubbing her eyes.

"Erik is in the hospital," Darcy told her. Jane shot upright, looking around wildly.

"What?" she asked again. "What happened?"

Darcy turned expectantly to Agent Sitwell, who had followed her into the apartment. Sitwell took a deep breath. "When Loki first arrived, he used unfamiliar technology to create some sort of hypnosis over Dr Selvig, which resulted in Dr Selvig becoming extremely receptive to orders from Loki. He was held in this condition for several days before the hypnosis was broken. It appears there may be some aftereffects psychologically and physiologically."

"Mind control," Jane said flatly. "You're basically saying he was mind-controlled by Loki."

Sitwell shifted his weight. "In simplistic terms, yes."

"Oh, my god," Jane said, unknowingly echoing Darcy. She flung off the blanket she was wrapped in. "Where is he?"

"He's being treated at a SHIELD facility," Sitwell said, trying to reassure her. "He is getting the best possible care."

"I want to see him," Jane said. "We are going to see him and you are going to take us there. Now."

"Dr Foster, I've been asked to bring you to our facility in Washington to analyze the readings we recorded on the portal during the incident in Manhattan," Sitwell said, shaking his head.

"Erik first," Jane insisted.

"It's essential we get you to Washington as soon as possible," Sitwell tried to protest.

Jane held up a hand. "No. Erik first. You know what, where's Coulson? I want to talk to him. He's the one we've been working with. Where is he?"

Sitwell hesitated visibly. "Agent Coulson was killed in action during the incident," he said quietly.

Darcy and Jane both froze, turning to stare at Sitwell. "Okay," Jane said unevenly. "Okay. We'll go to Washington, but I still want to see Erik, make sure he's alright."

"That can be arranged," Sitwell promised.

Darcy and Jane had gotten last-minute packing down to a science. Both of them were dressed and ready to go in half an hour.

XxxXxxX

The Shield facility in Washington, DC was called the Triskelion and Darcy hated it the moment she stepped through the front doors. She had a crawly feeling up and down her spine as if the building was going to collapse around her ears any second. But for Jane's sake she kept her mouth shut as they were escorted directly to a lab full of sci-fi equipment.

Jane set her laptop bag down and crossed her arms. "Okay. I want to see Erik now."

Sitwell nodded. "He's in the medical wing. I'll take you now."

"Wait, you mean he was in the same building this whole time?" Darcy demanded.

Sitwell nodded, face blank. Darcy stalked past him out of the lab. "Asshole," she shot at him.

Dr Selvig was in an isolation room, hooked up to some kind of brain monitoring machine, and was asleep when Darcy and Jane arrived. Jane hovered at the side of his bed, looking uncertain. Darcy took a more direct approach. She took his hand in both of hers and squeezed gently.

"Erik?" she called. "Dr Selvig?"

He blinked awake and looked around, momentarily confused. "Jane, Darcy," he mumbled. "What are you doing here?"

"Making sure you're all right," Jane told him, patting his arm. "How do you feel?"

"Is he gone?" Erik asked, eyes darting around the room. "They said they took him away. He's gone, isn't he?"

"Who's gone?" Darcy asked with a frown.

"Loki," Erik whispered hoarsely. He reached out and grabbed Jane's hand tightly. "He made me do such terrible things. I didn't want to, Jane. I swear. I didn't want to."

"I know, Erik," Jane assured him. "It's alright. I know."

Erik dozed off again. Jane dragged a chair over to his bedside and sat down. "I'm going to stay with him a while," she told Darcy.

Darcy nodded. "I'm gonna try to find some coffee. You want?"

"Please," Jane said gratefully.

Darcy wandered out into the hallway and looked around for something resembling a break room. The only other person was a red-haired woman in jeans and a gray hoodie two sizes too large for her.

"Excuse me," Darcy called, walking towards the woman. She stopped and turned around to look at Darcy. She waited until Darcy caught up with her.

"Can I help you?" the woman said politely. Darcy didn't miss the woman's quick scan of her person, and the half-second lingering of her eyes on Darcy's visitor's pass clipped to the front of her sweater.

"Hi, um, do you know where I can get a couple cups of coffee?" Darcy asked. "My boss and I are visiting a friend, and we just got off a plane from Norway."

"You're visiting Dr Selvig, aren't you?" the woman asked. "You work for Dr Foster?"

"Yeah," Darcy replied, nodding. "That obvious?"

"Selvig's the only other patient in this wing," the woman said. "Come on. I'll show you the cafeteria. I was heading there myself."

"Thanks," Darcy said gratefully. "I'm Darcy, by the way."

"Natasha," the redhead replied, offering her hand. Darcy reached out to take it. The moment their hands touched, however, the scent and taste of blood assaulted Darcy like a physical blow. It took all of her self control not to snatch her hand away. But the sensation vanished when Natasha gripped her hand, replaced by the smell of cinnamon and the taste of snow.

"Nice to meet you," Natasha went on. "Glad Selvig has people."

"He's family," Darcy said, clearing her throat. "You said he was the only other patient? There's another one?"

Natasha's expression shuttered closed abruptly and Darcy backpedaled, holding up her hands. "Sorry. Let me guess. Classified?"

"You're good at this," Natasha said with a faint smile.

"We've been working with SHIELD for the last year," Darcy explained. "You get used to hearing that. A lot."

The cafeteria that Natasha lead her to was only sparsely occupied, but all of the other people were all wearing suits, in sharp contrast to Natasha and Darcy's wardrobes. Natasha didn't seem bothered at being underdressed and made straight for the coffee makers.

"I don't know how, but this cafeteria has the best coffee in the building," Natasha explained.

Darcy tasted it gingerly. "It's not terrible," she admitted. "You guys should get a Starbucks in here."

"None of their employees can pass the background checks," Natasha replied. "Let me walk you back. It's easy to get lost in here."

As they left the cafeteria with their coffee, Darcy turned to Natasha. "Can I ask you a question?"

"I can't guarantee you're cleared to hear the answer, but shoot," Natasha replied.

"Do you know the funeral details for Agent Coulson?" Darcy asked delicately.

Natasha gave her a sharp look. "Yeah. I'll get them to you," she said after a minute.

"Thanks," Darcy said gratefully. "We only worked with him off and on, but he was good people."

"Yeah, he was," Natasha agreed quietly. She nodded towards a door. "That's you. Good talking to you, Darcy."

"You too," Darcy said. "Thanks again." She bumped the door open with her hip and entered the room to find Jane asleep in her chair, head tilted back and mouth partly open. Darcy set Jane's coffee on the table next to her and curled up in the other chair. She pulled out her phone.

Joanna Lewis answered on the second ring. "Darcy?" she asked, her voice pitched high.

"Hi, mom," Darcy said with a watery smile.

"Are you okay, sweetie?" Joanna demanded. "We saw the news. I can't believe it!"

"We were in Oslo, mom. We weren't anywhere near New York," Darcy assured her, and justified it as only a half lie.

"Where are you now?" Joanna asked.

"DC," Darcy replied.

"What are you doing there?" Joanna asked.

"Work. You know how it is," Darcy told her. "Jane is the best in her field. She gets asked to consult a lot."

"How long are you going to be there?" Joanna asked. "I could come down for a few days. It's not that far of a drive."

Darcy rubbed her eyes. "I don't know. I'll ask. But I'd really love to see you."

"I'm just glad you're alright, sweetie. You know your father and I worry about you."

"I know," Darcy said with a sigh. "I love what I'm doing, though. You know that, right?"

"Of course we do," Joanna assured her. "And we're so proud of you. We just want you to be safe."

"I'm safe, mom," Darcy said. "I promise. Can you tell dad I miss him? Oh, and can he email me his apple cake recipe? Jane's birthday is next month and I promised I'd make it for her."

"I will," Joanna promised. "We miss you too, sweetie."

"Love you," Darcy said, smiling again.

"Love you too, Darcy."

Darcy lowered the phone and stared at the picture of her mother until the screen went dark. It had gotten so easy to lie to everyone close to her. She was really starting to get sick of it. Darcy took a deep breath and looked at her cup of coffee. She put it on the side table and closed her eyes.

"Heimdall, I know you can hear me," she said under her breath. "I really need to come to Asgard, so if you could undo my no-fly status, I'd appreciate it."

She didn't feel anything change, but she trusted Heimdall enough to believe that he had heard her. She dug around in her backpack until she found the bottle of melatonin supplements. As tired as she was, it wouldn't take much for her to fall asleep.

Darcy woke up somewhere cold and dark, someplace she didn't instantly recognize. She sat up with a jerk and looked around. It was a long corridor made of dark stone, interspersed with glowing golden panels. She got to her feet and walked over to one of the panels. It was actually a barrier, and on the other side was a white-walled cell. The cell's occupant caught sight of her and lunged at the barrier with a hiss. Darcy recoiled hard enough to lose her balance and she fell hard onto her ass, scooting backwards until her back hit a wall.

"What do we have here?" asked a smooth voice from above her. "You do not belong here."

Darcy spun around, raising herself up onto her knees, and looked up. The man on the other side of the barrier smiled at her like a shark approaching its prey. He had ice-white skin and ink-black hair, jade-green eyes bright with intelligence and not a small amount of madness.

Darcy lunged to her feet, her jaw slack with shock. "Holy shit," she said.

Loki kept smiling at her. "I take it you know who I am, then."


	3. The Crown Hangs Heavy On Either Side

Darcy had always had a way with words. She was quick-witted, always on the ball with a quip or a joke. She took a great deal of pride in that fact. But on this occasion, confronted with the man on the other side of the golden forcefield, she found herself at loss for words.

"You!" she spat, jabbing her finger in his direction. "You're you!"

Loki clicked his tongue. "It never ceases to amaze me how articulate you humans are," he said, tilting his head to the side. "Speaking of which, how did a human manage to get past the Allfather's guards?"

"Business," Darcy said, backing away and crossing her arms. "None of yours." She turned around in a complete circle but did not see any sign of a door. "Heimdall, this isn't what I had in mind when I said I wanted to come back to Asgard," she muttered. She picked a direction and started walking.

Loki kept pace with her until he reached the limit of his cell. "You are going in the wrong direction," he called as she walked away. She ground to a stop, gritted her teeth, and turned around.

"You don't know where I'm going," she yelled back at him.

"Deeper into the dungeons, apparently," Loki replied with a smirk.

Darcy blushed in embarrassment and anger, but lifted her chin and stalked back past his cell in the other direction.

"That is the wrong direction as well," he said as she crossed in front of him. "At least, if you are trying to leave the dungeons."

She stopped dead in her tracks, refusing to look over at him. "You're lying," she said.

"It is probable," he admitted. He clasped his hands behind his back. "I can tell you how to get back to the surface."

Darcy slowly turned to face him. "And why would you do that?" she asked sarcastically. "Out of the goodness of your heart?"

"I am willing to make a trade," Loki offered, rocking back onto his heels. "Knowledge for knowledge."

"No thanks," Darcy said, turning her back on him. "I can find my own way out of here."

"Of course!" Loki said. "After all, it isn't as if the dungeons stretch on for miles under the city, and are designed as a labyrinth to entrap prisoners should they attempt to escape. You should have no trouble finding your way out. Best of luck!"

Darcy exhaled sharply through her nose. He was lying, she told herself. That's what Loki did. He lied. She shook her head and started walking.

And kept walking.

And walked some more.

And walked a little bit further.

"Son of a bitch," she said, looking around. She'd walked in a straight line for what seemed like hours, ignoring the perpendicular halls, hoping that she would eventually reach something that resembled an exit sign, to no avail. "Seriously?" She turned right and trudged down the corridor, glancing into each cell she passed without paying much attention until she reached a familiar one.

"You have got to be kidding me," Darcy said, glaring up at Loki again. He rose to his feet from where he was sitting on a narrow couch and crossed over towards her.

"I did give you fair warning," he said. "Are you ready to bargain with me?"

"I don't want anything from you," Darcy snarled, and turned her back on him. Her legs were tired and her feet ached from walking on the hard, unyielding stone in inadequate shoes. She didn't particularly feel like walking anymore, so she lowered herself to the ground and sat cross-legged, elbows propped on her knees. She checked her watch. She'd been in the dungeons for just over four hours. That was a long time to sleep in a chair in a hospital room. She was probably going to wake up any minute now.

"I am not certain, but I do not think you are going to find a way out of the dungeons by sitting there," Loki said from behind her.

"I don't have to find a way out," she growled at him without turning around. "I just have to wait. Shut up."

"If you know who I am, then you know that is not likely."

Darcy sighed, and then scooted herself around. "I know you're a liar and a coward, and that you murdered thousands of people so you could throw a temper tantrum about how daddy didn't love you as much as Thor," she spat at him.

He didn't look bothered by her accusations. "If that is what you think, then you don't know much at all, I'm afraid," he replied, beginning to pace along the edge of his cell. "Tell me, how does a human come to be here, in Asgard, with that kind of knowledge?"

"Like I'm going to tell you anything," Darcy said. "You've tried to kill me twice already. I'm not interested in having a conversation with you."

"I assure you it was nothing personal," Loki told her. "I am sure you were simply inconveniently located."

Darcy opened her mouth to bite out a scathing reply and stopped herself. She was going about this all wrong. She did not have to sit there and let him taunt her. She took a deep breath to center herself, called up her power, and trained all of her focus on him.

The pain drove the breath right out of her body. She gasped, clutching at her ribs as they tried to expand, but couldn't. It was as if her whole body was an open wound, an exposed nerve, sending wave after wave of agony through her brain. Her vision whited out and she curled up on the hard, cold ground, cradling her head and trying to scream through clenched teeth.

A hand grabbed her shoulder and she jerked away. For a split second she was falling, and then she hit the ground, disoriented. She cast around, unsure of where she was or what was happening. Her body ached, every muscle sore as if they had spent hours clenched and rigid. Her head pounded and her jaw felt locked in place.

"Darcy, are you okay?" Jane asked, crouching next to her.

It took Darcy a moment to work her jaw loose. "Yeah," she said hoarsely. She was in the medical wing of the Triskelion, in Erik's room. Loki and the Asgardian dungeons were light years away. "Nightmare," she grunted, hauling herself off the floor.

"Must have been a hell of a one," Jane said, helping her up. "You were shaking all over."

"'M fine," Darcy muttered. She rubbed her eyes. "What time is it?"

"Almost midnight," Jane said. "Agent Sitwell is kicking us out of here in five minutes. He said they have an apartment ready for us. We should probably get some sleep."

The thought of going back to the dungeons drove Darcy into full wakefulness. "I'm good," she said, blinking her eyes wide. "I'm great. Sleep? We don't need sleep. Don't we have work to do? Let's do science."

Jane frowned at Darcy. "Are you sure you're okay?"

Darcy waved her off. "I'm fine. I slept on the flight here. Besides, time difference. It's in morning back in Norway."

Jane eyed her in disbelief. "Darce, we were in Norway for three days."

"Plenty of time to get adjusted," Darcy said, trying (and failing) to sound like her normal, perky self. She looked over at Erik, who was still sleeping. "How's he doing?" she asked, changing the subject.

"He woke up a few times but he's still confused. Whatever Loki did to him really messed him up," Jane said sadly.

A cold rage pooled at the bottom of Darcy's stomach as she pictured Loki's unrepentant smirk. She had never wanted to hurt another person before, never tried to see if she could, but now she wondered if there was anything in her abilities that would let her find a way to punish Loki for what he had done.

Jane put her hand on Darcy's arm. "Hey, it's gonna be okay," she assured the younger woman. "Erik is strong and insanely stubborn. He's not gonna let some crazy megalomaniac alien keep him down for long."

"Yeah," Darcy said softly. She looked over at Jane. "We should get back to our apartment. Get settled in."

A SHIELD car took them to their apartment, which was a three bedroom flat on the top floor of a renovated building from the nineteen twenties in uptown. It was only a short ride on the Metro to the Triskelion, and it was fully furnished in a quaint, inviting style.

"I'm picturing SHIELD agents binge-watching HGTV and taking notes," Darcy said, dropping her bags in the living room. She went to the kitchen and opened the pantry. "Nice," she murmured to herself, seeing that it was fully stocked. She opened the fridge next. "Nicer," she observed, seeing that it was similarly fully stocked. She poked around for a couple of seconds before she caught sight of a Kosher label. She blinked a couple of times. "Huh," she said.

"Jane!" she called. "You hungry?" There was no reply so Darcy went looking for her friend, only to find Jane curled up on top of the bed in one of the bedrooms, snoring faintly. "Okay then," she said softly, closing the door.

Darcy showered, unpacked, prepped two handmade pizzas and put them in the freezer for later before she admitted to herself that she was stalling. Even with her nap at the Triskelion she was still exhausted and she needed to sleep if she was going to keep up with Jane during her manic science phase that was sure to be coming soon. So she trudged back to the bedroom she'd claimed for herself and crawled under the covers. She tossed and turned for a couple of hours before sleep finally caught her off-guard.

She opened her eyes and looked around. "Shit," she said succinctly, wrapping her arms around herself.

"Vulgar words often reveal a vulgar mind," Loki commented, putting his book aside and rising to his feet. "To be honest, I am surprised you returned."

"Trust me, it wasn't my first choice," Darcy snapped back. He raised an eyebrow at her.

"Are you recovered?" he asked, his voice cordial. "You appeared to be in pain when you departed last."

"Why the hell would you care?" Darcy demanded, scowling at him. "You'd probably sooner kill me."

Loki held up his hands in a placating gesture. "As I told you before, I hold no personal malice towards you. If my actions have put you in harm's way, you have my apologies."

Darcy eyed him suspiciously. "Why are you being nice all the sudden? What do you want?"

"Am I not bound by geis to offer hospitality to those under my roof?" Loki replied. He stretched his arms out to his sides. "And seeing as how this is to be my home for the rest of my days…" he lowered his arms and clasped his hands behind his back.

Darcy's suspicion did not abate. "And this has nothing to do with the fact that you can catch more flies with honey," she said dryly.

"Why would anyone want to catch flies?" Loki asked with a faint smirk, head tilting.

Darcy jabbed a finger at him. "You don't fool me. I just spent the day sitting next to my friend, who you put in the hospital. He's probably never going to be the same again, and it's your fault."

"Shall I send flowers?" Loki asked. "That is what you mortals do, is it not?"

Darcy ground her teeth together, that cold rage bubbling up into her chest. "Do not mock me," she said icily. She poured all her anger and her power into her words. "Do not presume to make light of the pain you have caused. If you do not have the decency to be repentant, then at least have the intelligence to guard your words in front of someone who could wipe you from existence."

Loki took a full step backwards from the force of her words. Darcy didn't know if she could actually do what she threatened, but she was really willing to try. He studied her closely, a shrewd expression on his face.

"So," Loki said, still staring at her. "Not a human. What are you, little girl?"

"Knowledge is power, buddy, and you're not getting any from me," Darcy snapped.

"Oh but you have already given me so much," Loki said, starting to pace. "Female, nubile, in her prime of life, comes and goes as she pleases. And that is interesting as well. You are a dream-walker, are you not?"

Darcy scowled, trying to figure out she always seemed to manage to come out worse for wear in her conversations with him. "No," she said bluntly. "I'm not talking to you anymore."

Loki gestured theatrically. "Well, you are welcome to leave at any time," he said mockingly.

Darcy glared at him for a moment before groaning. She knew something that would definitely wake her up and take her away from this place, but it wasn't going to be pleasant. She gritted her teeth, called up her power, and tried to read Loki.

It was like sandpaper over an exposed nerve, like pouring acid over an open wound. Her brain felt like it was melting with the pain. Her vision whited out and there was a high-pitched ringing in her ears, but she could just hear an otherworldly voice hissing words at her.

" _You will wish for something as sweet as pain."_

Darcy woke up in her new bedroom in DC, curled up into a ball so tightly her muscles were aching from the strain. It took her several minutes to convince her muscles to relax, focusing on them one by one until she finally managed to uncurl. Her pajamas were drenched in sweat and her breathing was ragged as she lay on the bed, exhausted. She reached up and pressed her hand against her face.

The first time she'd read Loki, she thought he'd purposefully inflicted the pain, or it was some kind of psychic feedback from him blocking her. But this time, it had been different. This time, she'd realized the pain had come from _inside_ Loki.

Darcy abruptly sat up as realization hit her with the force of a mack truck. Loki was _constantly_ in that much pain. How was he able to stand, much less string together enough words for a snarky remark? And where was the pain coming from? It wasn't physical pain, of that much she was certain. The pain, whatever its origin, was definitely psychic. Someone was inflicting pain on Loki, and she wanted to know who. And why.

Darcy twisted to look at the clock sitting on the bedside table. She still had three hours until Jane would probably wake up and start her morning forage for caffeine. Of course, Darcy was wired and completely wide awake. She ground her teeth together. She couldn't believe she was actually considering doing this for _Loki_ , of all people. She was fairly certain he would never be grateful enough to make it worth it.

As she suspected, the swanky apartment SHIELD had set up for them had a fully-stocked liquor bar. Darcy, being a poor college student, prefered her alcohol of the "cheap and plentiful" variety, and therefore had no appreciation for the bottles in the cabinets under the wet bar. But she found one she could stand the taste of and started chugging.

And because Darcy was fond of cheap and plentiful alcohol, it took over half the bottle before she started getting sleepy. It was somewhere after the "can't walk straight" stage, but thankfully before the "the room is spinning" stage. Darcy just really wanted to lay down and close her eyes and not contemplate the headache she was going to have in the morning. She was still cogent enough to put the bottle away and get a glass of water before collapsing on the couch.

She woke up in Asgard, not, to her intense relief, in the dungeons. She was on a terrace connected to the library, stretched out on one of the chaise lounges Asgardian interior designers seemed fond of. Darcy quickly jumped to her feet and had to abruptly sit back down again.

"Drunk dream-walking," she muttered to herself. "Awesome." She got her feet again, much slower this time, and set off for the potted tree she'd hidden her Asgardian robe behind. Then she went in search of Lady Frigga. Darcy had only had a handful of encounters with Lady Frigga since their first meeting, but she found that the noblewoman always seemed to be exactly where Darcy needed her. So, par for the course, it didn't take long for Darcy to find her.

"I need a book on psychic connections," Darcy blurted as soon as she saw the blonde Asgardian.

Lady Frigga turned away from the woman she'd been speaking to and looked Darcy up and down. "You look unwell, child," she observed kindly. "Have you taken ill?"

Darcy tried to shake her head but stopped when she lost her balance. "I'm drunk," she explained.

Lady Frigga dismissed the other woman with a wave and came to stand in front of Darcy. "Why did you come here in this condition, Darcy Lewis?"

"Had to get to sleep somehow," Darcy said, proud of the fact she did not slur her words. She tapped the side of her forehead. "Trouble sleeping sometimes. You know how it is."

Lady Frigga reached out and gently took Darcy's arm. "Come with me, child."

"But I need a book!" Darcy protested as Lady Frigga led her out of the library.

"I will find you the book you need," Lady Frigga promised. "But first let us see to your more pressing needs." She tucked Darcy's hand into the crook of her elbow and guided her through the passageways of the city.

"Are we going to the palace?" Darcy asked, her eyes wide as she stared around her unfamiliar surroundings. "I've never been to the palace before."

"Yes, we are going to the palace," Lady Frigga told her.

Darcy continued to ogle the scenery as they walked for what seemed like a terribly long time first through the city, and then through the palace, until they reached a cozy sitting room with a fantastic view of what remained of the Bifrost. Lady Frigga helped Darcy sit down on a couch and then vanished, leaving Darcy stroking a fur blanket happily.

"Here," Lady Frigga said, reappearing. She placed a steaming cup in Darcy's hands. "Drink this."

Darcy peered into the cup curiously. The liquid was pale cream in color, frothy with flecks of brown on top. She inhaled deeply. The aroma was pleasant and spicy, but unfamiliar. She took a cautious first sip. It was not entirely unlike chai tea, though there was a definite reminiscence of chocolate, and a faint bitterness that reminded her of coffee. Whatever it was, it cleared her head after only a few sips.

"This is amazing," Darcy said, huddling over the cup. "What is it?"

"It's called _kava,_ " Lady Frigga told her. "It's quite popular among those who have celebrated their victories with a little too much enthusiasm."

"It's delicious," Darcy said. "And thank you."

"In your state, it's not likely that any studying you did would do you much good," Lady Frigga said with a smile.

Darcy grimaced. "Eh, well, it was that or sedatives, and I'm not a fan of drugging myself silly."

Lady Frigga sat on the couch next to Darcy and folded her hands. "You asked me about psychic connections," she said. "Might I ask why?"

Darcy chose her next words carefully. Given Loki's current position, it was not likely Lady Frigga would willingly help her if Darcy told her the whole truth. "If there was someone, for example, who had a psychic connection that was causing them pain, would there be anything, hypothetically, that you could do about it?" Darcy asked, still gripping her cup tightly to her chest.

"Well, that depends on the connection, and the people who are a part of it," Lady Frigga said, tilting her head.

Darcy mulled that over for a few minutes. "What if it wasn't...consensual?" she asked slowly.

Lady Frigga gave her an unreadable look. "It could, in theory, be severed, given the victimized party desired it strongly enough, and the one who severed it had greater power than the one who forged it."

"Oh," Darcy said softly, and went back to staring into her cup. "How would you do that? Sever it?"

"It would not be easy," Lady Frigga warned her. "But if you truly wish to know, I will teach you."

Darcy's eyes jumped up to Lady Frigga's face. "You know how to do it?" she asked curiously.

"I do have a passable knowledge of what your people call magic," Lady Frigga replied, amused. "But what you wish to do will take a great deal of strength, of both will and power."

Darcy sighed and took a long drink of the _kava_ before setting it aside. Again she wondered why she was willing to do this for Loki, of all people. "Yeah, okay," she said, resigned. "Let's do this."

XxxXxxX

It took a week of nightly lessons before Lady Frigga declared Darcy ready. The lessons were emotionally and mentally exhausting, which meant that Darcy woke up every morning more tired than she'd gone to sleep, and usually ended up dozing in the lab while Jane worked. The rest of the time she stayed hopped up on caffeine just in order to stay awake.

While Jane was not happy to be working directly for SHIELD, she was intensely interested in the data SHIELD provided her from both portals caused by the Tesseract. She would have worked around the clock on analyzing the data if Darcy hadn't dragged her away to eat, sleep, and visit Erik.

Erik was released from the medical wing after three days, but was kept in the Triskelion for observation. They tried to bring him into Jane's lab, but he'd had a flashback so bad they'd had to sedate him. Darcy checked in on him several times a day, in between his therapy appointments. It was as she was leaving from escorting him to his latest one that she ran into Natasha again.

Natasha was walking with a sandy-haired man in a SHIELD sweatshirt and torn jeans, but she slowed down and waved at Darcy from down the hall. As Darcy approached them, Natasha smiled in greeting.

"It's Darcy, right?" Natasha asked.

"Yup, that's me," Darcy replied. She took a second look at Natasha's companion. "Yo, Barton. Long time no see."

The male agent bobbed his head and smiled faintly. "Lewis. Keeping out of trouble?"

"Me? Never!" Darcy replied.

Natasha looked between them. "You two know each other?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, we met in New Mexico," Darcy told her. "SHIELD came in and confiscated all of Jane's equipment, and Katniss here helped me get my iPod back. I still owe you for that one."

"You bought drinks during the clean up, remember?" Barton asked. "I'd call us even."

Darcy flapped a hand dismissively. "Alcohol is temporary. Music is forever. I still need to make up for it."

"What are you doing here?" Barton asked. He shoved his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. "Heard you were in Norway."

"Pretty sure they just sent us there to get us out of the way," Darcy said dryly. "Jane's analyzing data from the portals in New York."

Barton nodded, his eyes sliding away from hers and staring off into the distance. Darcy frowned. She recognized that look. It was the same one Erik got if he was left by himself for too long. She opened her mouth to say something but Natasha interrupted.

"Here, before I forget." She handed Darcy a card.

Darcy looked down at it. It was trimmed in black and had Agent Coulson's name printed at the top, along with an address and a time. "Oh," she said, her mood darkening. "Thanks." She sighed deeply.

"How's Dr Selvig?" Natasha asked gently.

"He's getting better," Darcy said, pocketing the card. "It's not gonna be easy, though." She sighed through her teeth. "I'd punch Loki right in the nose if I could," she said darkly. It wasn't a lie, despite how Darcy had spent her last seven evenings. The only thing keeping her from doing so was the golden barrier between them whenever she visited the dungeons.

"You don't have to worry about Loki anymore," Natasha said firmly, but she was looking at Barton as she spoke.

Darcy snorted. _Not likely_ , she thought. She shrugged. "I gotta get back to Jane. If she doesn't have constant supervision, she might accidentally create an Einstein-Rosen Bridge to other side of the universe." She offered her knuckles to Barton. "Keep it real, Legolas."

He obliged her with a fist bump. "Watch your back, Lewis," he replied. Darcy frowned at him again as he and Natasha left. Natasha had mentioned another patient in Erik's wing… She shuddered and shook her head. If Barton had been another one of Loki's victims…

"Damn it," she whispered to herself. "What the hell are you thinking, Darcy?" She headed back to Jane's lab, wondering for the hundredth time why she was even considering helping Loki.

XxxXxxX

It took Darcy five tries and two nights to dream-walk into the Asgardian dungeons. She'd have thought she would be better at it after ten years of practice, but she still ended up in places she didn't want to be more often than not. As soon as she realized she was in the dungeons, she made a beeline for Loki's now-familiar cell.

"I can't believe I'm actually going to do this," she growled at him, "But I'm going to fix you."

He laughed humorlessly. "I am afraid it will take more than wishful thinking to achieve that, mortal girl."

"You and I both know I've got more than wishful thinking going for me," Darcy snapped.

Loki didn't immediately reply. He studied her for a long moment. "Perhaps I do not desire to be 'fixed'," he said at length.

"Bullshit," Darcy said flatly. "I know how much pain you're in. I'm gonna take it away."

Loki frowned at her. It was the first time she'd seen anything less than smug confidence on his face. He stepped forward until he stood right before the barrier, the forcefield thickening in response to his proximity. "And why would you do that?" he asked, eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"Because I'm an idiot, apparently," Darcy said dryly. She crossed her arms defensively. "Now do you want me to help you, or do you want to suffer for the rest of your life?"

Loki continued to stare at her warily. "Why should I trust you?"

"I'm not the one who lied to his family and friends and tried to destroy two separate planets," Darcy pointed out. "And I don't see anyone else lining up to help you out."

He stepped away from the wall of his cage and began to pace back and forth, never taking his eyes off her. "You are not truly mortal, are you?" he asked. "It is impossible, a being with your powers."

Darcy shook her head. "Nuh-uh. That topic is off limits. You want my help, yes or no? One time offer."

Loki spread his hands to his sides. "What can I say? I am at your mercy."

Darcy lowered her arms. "Okay. This isn't gonna be easy, or pleasant, for either of us. Just try not to struggle, okay?" Without giving him a chance to respond, Darcy called up her power and focused on Loki. She didn't try to read him this time. She just lightly skimmed his mind like Frigga had showed her, trying to find the connection that was causing him pain.

She gagged when she found it. It felt like a festering sore, smelling and tasting of infection. It had once been deep and strong, but even weak and faded it would take nearly all of Darcy's strength to sever it.

Darcy took a deep breath and then reached into Loki's mind. She still did not attempt to read him, only pinpointing the memories directly related to the psychic bond. They burned hot and painful, literally and figuratively.

Darcy felt herself falling into the void, swallowed by the dying Bifrost, and landing, shattered and broken, on the far side of the universe. She saw the Other and his master, the mad Titan. She felt the fire and it was an unbearable pain for her, a son of the ice world. She felt them in her mind and in her dreams. She could not even sleep without their whispers in her head.

She heard them whisper to her of her rightful place as king. She heard their promises and saw their visions of a world conquered at her feet, and she knew it was empty, knew she was nothing more than a puppet, a plaything. She knew her own helplessness and she despised it. She saw the humans that had provoked her captors and she hated them. She wished them the same pain she had suffered.

Darcy knew all these things and gathered them up. She used her hatred, her anger, her pain, and she burned her captors from her mind, like cauterizing a wound.

Darcy woke up lying on her side on the cold floor. She was disoriented at first, feeling momentarily as if she was in the wrong body, but then she remembered she was not an Asgardian prince, that she was in actuality a human (of sorts), a norn, and very, very tired.

She opened her eyes to find that she was lying inside of Loki's cell, and he was lying on the floor beside her, his pale green eyes focused on her face. She yelped and scrambled backwards until she hit the golden forcefield, which sent an unpleasant shock through her body.

Loki was on his feet in a flash, catching her by her arms and pulling her away from the barrier. He helped her sit down and continued to hold her upright when she seemed inclined to collapse again.

He stared at her in something akin to wonder, as if she was some marvelous secret only he knew. "A norn," he said at length. "A human norn. Now there is something truly rare."

"Leggo of me," Darcy mumbled.

Loki obliged and Darcy slowly slumped to the floor again. She couldn't summon enough energy to care that she was inside a locked cell with a mass murderer, or that Loki had somehow discovered her secret.

"Water," she demanded from the floor. Loki rose to his feet again and went to the pitcher on a small table in the corner. He returned with a silver cup. Darcy took it from him and drained it greedily. She handed it back and closed her eyes.

"Sleep now," she said before losing consciousness.


	4. Just A Villain Vying For Attention

**_Jane was suspended in midair, held off the ground by some unseen force. She was plunged in blood-red light, surrounded by ripples of darkness like water. A terrible power surged through her, tearing her apart cell by cell. A dark figure stretched out its hand towards Jane and she stiffened, back arching in pain as the dark figure drained the life out of her…_**

 **Darcy woke up thrashing, trying to get to her friend before the dark figure killed her. She jerked upright, tangled in the sheets, and stared wildly around the darkened bedroom. It took her a moment before she realized she wasn't in Loki's cell, and another before she realized she'd been dreaming.**

 **Her head felt like it had been split in two, and her body ached as if she had gone ten rounds with someone twice her size. Her pajamas were stiff with dried sweat and her mouth tasted like copper. With a groan, Darcy collapsed backwards onto her pillows and rolled over to check the clock.**

 **"** **Shit!" she spat, and scrambled to untangle herself from the sheets. She padded across the hallway to Jane's room and knocked. "Janey? You up?" When there was no reply, Darcy opened the door and stuck her head inside. She could hear the shower running and there was a black dress laid out on the bed, the one Darcy had picked up earlier that week.**

 **Satisfied that Jane was up and getting ready, Darcy retreated to her own bedroom and took the shortest possible shower. She twisted her wet hair up into a simple chignon so she could slap some makeup on, and dug her only pair of dress shoes out of her closet, which was already a disaster zone. Her own dress was hanging on the back of the closet door, and Darcy somehow managed to get the zipper up by herself.**

 **When she emerged again from her bedroom, Jane was using the mirror by the front door to put her earrings in. "Car's already waiting for us," she said.**

 **"** **We're gonna be laaaate," Darcy bemoaned, tucking her clutch under one elbow and fiddling with her key ring. She finally found the right key and shooed Jane out into the hall so she could lock the front door behind them. The driver said nothing as they got into the vehicle, Jane still fixing the pins keeping her hair up.**

 **"** **Let me," Darcy said, slapping her hands out of the way and doing it herself.**

 **The venue was already crowded when they arrived. A guard at the door checked their SHIELD badges (official employee ones now, no more visitor's passes). Just inside the doorway was a table holding a large wreath of flowers and a framed photo of Agent Coulson.**

 **Agent Coulson's funeral and interment had already taken place back in his hometown with his extended family. SHIELD, however, was holding three different memorial services for him at various SHIELD bases to allow all the agents who wanted to attend to pay their respects.**

 **Darcy headed straight for the bar and got two glasses of wine, one of which she handed to Jane. "You're gonna need this," she said. Jane took the glass without arguing and drained it in one go.**

 **"** **I hate funerals," Jane said in a low voice. She looked around. "Everyone here probably knew Coulson better than we did."**

 **"** **Probably," Darcy agreed, throwing back her own glass of wine.**

 **A slight-statured man with curly, salt-and-pepper hair and glasses edged nervously out of the crowd and walked toward them. Darcy turned to square off with him, instinctively moving to protect Jane. Jane didn't notice, but the man slowed his approach, eying Darcy and silently asking permission to continue. She looked him up and down and gave a slight nod.**

 **"** **Dr Foster?" the man asked, stopping a respectful distance away.**

 **Jane gave him a polite smile, extending her hand. "Yes. And you are?"**

 **"** **Bruce Banner," the man replied, taking her hand.**

 **"** **Holy crap," Darcy blurted, eyes widening.**

 **Banner cringed visible, snatching his hand away from Jane. "I'm sorry?" he stuttered, looking as if he was about to flee.**

 **"** **Oh, I'm sorry," Darcy said, reaching out to grab his sleeve but remembering to stop just in time. "I didn't mean...I just, I have wanted to meet you ever since I read your articles on climate change in** ** _Science Earth_** **. They were fantastic!"**

 **"** **Oh," Banner said, relaxing. He gave her a faint smile. "That's not usually the reason people want to meet me."**

 **"** **Well, I'm not much into genetics, so I don't really have any other excuse to fangirl over you," Darcy said with a rueful smile.**

 **"** **Thank you," Banner said sincerely. He turned to Jane. "I just wanted to know how your work was going. I heard that you were analyzing the data from the Tesseract."**

 **"** **I could probably be working on that data for years," Jane said. "We picked up dark matter emissions from the portal, x energy, and half a dozen other emissions I don't have names for yet. And we're still not completely sure yet how the Tesseract actually functions. It has behavior patterns, erratic outbursts of energy, almost as if it's partially sentient."**

 **"** **Aaaaand that's my cue to leave," Darcy said. She smiled again at Banner. "If you understand anything she just said, you're welcome to keep her company. I'm gonna go mingle a bit." She poked Jane in the shoulder. "Behave, and get something to eat before you have any more wine."**

 **"** **Yes, mother," Jane said, batting Darcy's hand away.**

 **Darcy had caught sight of Natasha and Barton across the room and picked her way over to say hello. Natasha was reading something on her phone and Barton leaned against the wall, the thousand-yard stare firmly in place. "Hey," Darcy called as she approached. "Clint. You all right?"**

 **He blinked and focused on her face. "Lewis. Hey. When did you get here?"**

 **"** **Five minutes ago," Darcy gestured over her shoulder. "Dr Banner and Jane are discussing sciencey things and I get tired with having to pull out my dictionary every five words so…" she trailed off with a shrug.**

 **"** **Yeah," Clint nodded. "Know the feeling. You shoulda seen it when Banner and Stark got going."**

 **"** **Stark likes to use the big words on purpose," Natasha commented without looking up from her phone. "It makes him feel smarter."**

 **"** **Man's a genius," Barton said flatly. "Has the common sense of a rock."**

 **Darcy looked between them. "You guys were there, weren't you? In New York, with Thor?"**

 **Natasha finally tore her eyes away from her phone. "Yes," she said tersely, but politely. "Thor mentioned you, by the way."**

 **"** **He did?" Darcy leaned forward slightly. "What did he say?"**

 **"** **Coulson told him that we'd gotten Dr Foster to a safe place," Natasha replied. "Thor said he had no doubt of her safety as long as you were with her." Natasha raised an eyebrow. "He said something about you being a lightning-sister?"**

 **Darcy bobbed her head. "Yeah. When we first met him, Thor kinda freaked us out, so I shot him with my taser."**

 **Clint blinked at her again. "You tased Thor?" he asked slowly.**

 **"** **Uh-huh," Darcy smiled faintly. "Knocked his butt right out. Good thing, too. I don't think we could have gotten him to the hospital otherwise."**

 **"** **Hmm," Natasha observed, looking at Darcy with renewed interest.**

 **Agent Sitwell made his way over to them and leaned close to Natasha. "Ms Potts is asking for your help with Stark," he said in a low voice.**

 **Natasha rolled her eyes. "Already? I was going to give him an hour, at least." She looked at Darcy and hooked her thumb towards Barton. "Keep an eye on him for me, okay?"**

 **Darcy waved her hand. "Yeah, no prob."**

 **Clint made a face at Natasha, but the redhead merely levelled a firm look at him and sauntered away gracefully. Darcy leaned against the wall next to Clint.**

 **"** **So where's the best place to get pizza in town?"**

 **Clint snorted and uncrossed his arms, shoving them in his pockets. "Stefan's does a good pie. If you want New York style, though, you need to hit up Top Crust."**

 **"** **Either one of them do Kosher?" Darcy asked hopefully.**

 **Clint gave her a sidelong look. "There's a Kosher deli about two blocks from the Triskelion. Their pizza isn't terrible."**

 **"** **Not terrible," Darcy echoed dryly. "What a ringing endorsement."**

 **"** **You want Kosher, pizza probably isn't the best way to go," Clint replied. He tilted his head at her. "You go to temple?"**

 **"** **When I have to, why?" she asked, returning his sidelong look.**

 **He shrugged. "SHIELD holds services for most religions. I know there's a Rabbi that works at the Triskelion. And Yom Kippur is next month."**

 **"** **How do you even know that?" Darcy demanded.**

 **Clint shrugged again. "Friend of mine was Jewish."**

 **"** **Was?" Darcy questioned.**

 **"** **Dead," Clint said shortly.**

 **"** **Oh. I'm sorry," Darcy said, kicking herself.**

 **"** **Excuse me," said an unfamiliar male voice. Darcy glanced up and felt Clint straighten beside her.**

 **"** **Captain," Clint said, at the same time Darcy said, "Oh, crap."**

 **Darcy and the newcomer stared at each other for several seconds while Clint stared at Darcy. "So," Clint said slowly. "You two have met."**

 **"** **We've met," the man confirmed. He was wearing a suit now, not the ridiculous red, white, and blue outfit he'd sported a week prior. His hair, as it turned out, was blonde, but Darcy would have recognized that jawline anywhere. He gave her an intense look. "Can we talk privately?" he asked, politely but very firmly.**

 **"** **Yeah," Darcy said with a grimace. She handed her empty wineglass to Clint. "I'll be right back."**

 **The man followed Darcy as she headed for a far corner of the venue, out of the way and currently unoccupied. When she turned around to confront him, he had stopped just out of arm's reach. "So…" she said, wringing her hands together.**

 **"** **Who are you?" the man asked.**

 **"** **Please don't tell anyone about me," Darcy blurted.**

 **That seemed to take him off guard. "Wait, does SHIELD not know about you?"**

 **"** **No," Darcy said miserably. "And I really, really, really don't want them to."**

 **The man frowned. "I thought you were an agent. I thought they sent you to New York."**

 **Darcy shook her head. "No," she said again. "I didn't really mean to be there, but I didn't have much of a choice."**

 **The man studied her for a moment, and then extended his hand. "I'm Steve Rogers," he offered. "What's your name?"**

 **Darcy stared at him, ignoring his proffered hand. "Steve Rogers?" she asked, her voice squeaking. "As in** ** _the_** **Steve Rogers? Captain America Steve Rogers?"**

 **He awkwardly lowered his hand. "Yes?" he said uncertainly.**

 **"** **Oh, my God," Darcy said, her hands fluttering in excitement. "I thought you were just some guy they dressed up for propaganda. You're** ** _actually_** **Steve Rogers. How is that even possible? Why are you not, like, ninety years old? Why are you not, you know,** ** _dead_** **?"**

 **Captain Rogers' expression abruptly shut down, his eyes going blank and closed, and Darcy slapped her hand over her mouth.**

 **"** **I am so sorry," she said. "Don't answer that. I'm such an idiot. I'm Darcy, by the way. Darcy Lewis. Hi. I work for Dr Foster." She shoved her hand toward him.**

 **He gingerly shook her hand, his expression still blank. "She's Thor's girl, isn't she?" he asked.**

 **"** **If by 'girl' you mean they spent a weekend passionately staring into each other's eyes while trying not to get blown up by his dick of a brother after she ran him over with her van, then yes," Darcy replied. "Dr Foster is Thor's 'girl.' She also happens to be the country's most cutting-edge astrophysicist and one of the smartest women in the world, next to Elizabeth Ross and Helen Cho, probably."**

 **"** **I didn't mean any disrespect," Rogers began, but Darcy waved him off.**

 **"** **Sorry, that's just me being really defensive of my best friend. It seems like the only thing Jane gets asked anymore is how good of a kisser Thor is."**

 **Rogers blinked at her a couple of times, unsure of how to take that. Darcy made a half-aborted gesture and grimaced again. "Right. So you want to know about me."**

 **"** **I saw you get hit by one of the Chitauri weapons," Rogers said.**

 **"** **Yeah, and it hurt like a son of a bitch," Darcy said, rubbing her chest with one hand in remembered pain. "I couldn't breathe right for, like, three days."**

 **"** **How did you survive that?" Rogers demanded, pulling her back on track. "You don't have a scratch on you."**

 **Darcy heaved a sigh. "It's really complicated, but short version is, I can project myself to a separate location when I sleep. I can literally be in two places at once."**

 **Rogers frowned at her. "How are you able to do that?"**

 **Darcy shrugged. "Hell if I know. I've been doing it since I was thirteen. I went to sleep that night in Norway, woke up in New York City. Once I saw what was going on, I knew I had to help however I could."**

 **He kept frowning at her. "Does anyone else know about what you can do?"**

 **"** **No," Darcy lied. "And I would really appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone."**

 **"** **Why don't you want SHIELD to know?" he asked. "Isn't that what they do? Work with people like you?"**

 **Darcy glanced around to make sure that no one was within hearing range. "Have you heard about the Index?" she asked in a low voice.**

 **"** **No," he replied.**

 **"** **Well, you're probably on it. It's a list of everyone SHIELD knows who has abilities. And I don't know about you, but I would rather not spend the rest of my days in a laboratory getting poked and prodded by scientists." Darcy crossed her arms. "I already spend most of my time in a lab, but at least I like the scientist and I do all the poking and prodding."**

 **"** **Would they really do that?" Rogers demanded.**

 **Darcy shrugged. "Probably. I mean, they can't do that to you, you're a national icon. Stark is too rich, and no one wants to piss off Banner, so they're safe. But me, I'm a nobody. I don't have anyone protecting me."**

 **"** **They don't have the authority to lock you up," he insisted. "You haven't done anything wrong."**

 **Darcy rolled her eyes. "Patriot Act, buddy. Look it up. All they'd have to do is declare me a threat to national security and they can do whatever the hell they want."**

 **He mulled that over, his expression concerned. Darcy wrung her hands together again. "** ** _Please_** **don't tell anyone. I like my job, and I don't know how to live on the lam. I'd be really pathetic at it. Seriously. I can't last two minutes without my phone."**

 **"** **I won't tell anyone," he promised. "But you swear to me you're not going to hurt anyone?"**

 **Darcy stared at him, affronted. "Hurt someone? No! I would never. Unless they did something truly unforgivable, like took the last of the coffee, or insulted Jane. But no, seriously. I would never use my ability for evil." She held up two fingers. "Scout's honor."**

 **He nodded, eying her warily. "Alright," he said, sounding uncertain. "Just...try not to show up in the middle of a war zone again."**

 **"** **Trust me, I will do my best to avoid it," Darcy said whole-heartedly. "But I don't have the best control over it, yet."**

 **He frowned at her, concern forgotten in favor of curiosity. "Why not?"**

 **"** **It's kinda hard to practice," Darcy said dryly. "I can't just click my heels together and say 'there's no place like home'. Sometimes I go where I want, sometimes I don't."**

 **"** **Well, at least you don't land a house on anyone," he said, the corner of his mouth quirking upwards.**

 **"** **In her defense, that was a very bad person," Darcy said, shaking her finger at him. "I'd say her aim was pretty damn good."**

 **He chuckled at that, and Darcy finally relaxed. "You are remarkably okay with this whole, 'chick's got weird skills' thing," she observed. "What gives?"**

 **He tilted his head at her, processing her words for a moment before he puzzled out her meaning. Then he shrugged. "Well, so far this week I've seen an army from outer space, two Norse gods, a man that turns into a not-so-jolly green giant, and an aircraft carrier that flies." He smiled ruefully. "You're not that strange in comparison."**

 **Darcy laughed. "Well, thanks for putting me in my place. And thanks for not telling anyone. I owe you. You ever need anything, and I mean** ** _anything_** **, you let me know, okay?"**

 **He eyed her and nodded slowly. "All right," he agreed.**

 **Darcy grinned at him. "Okay. Now I have to show Jane that I just met Captain freakin' America!"**

 **XxxXxxX**

 **She was inside Loki's cell again, facing the golden barrier. Darcy whirled around to see Loki watching her, a book forgotten in his hand. Darcy backed away, but was careful not to touch the forcefield. "Just...stay away from me," she ordered, holding out a hand to ward him off.**

 **He tilted his head at her. "This is the fourth time you have come to visit me, norn. Should I be flattered?"**

 **"** **I'm not coming here by choice, trust me," Darcy said, edging further away from him. "You try anything and I will cut you."**

 **He put the book aside. "I have no intention of harming you," he assured her. "After all, it would appear I am in your debt."**

 **"** **Speaking of which," Darcy jabbed her finger in his direction. "I was in your head. Why didn't you tell Thor what Thanos and the Other did to you?"**

 **Loki's expression darkened with a startling swiftness. "As if that matters to anyone," he snapped. "You speak of things you do not understand."**

 **"** **I know they tortured you," Darcy insisted. "I know they threatened you."**

 **Loki rose to his feet and stalked over towards her. She skittered backwards until her back met unyielding, white stone. He loomed over her, hands clenched into fists. "I am no one's puppet," he hissed at her. "I have no weakness. Thanos had no power over me."**

 **"** **I was in your head," Darcy said again, fighting to keep her voice calm. "I know you're lying."**

 **"** **You know nothing," he spat, and raised a hand. What he intended to do, Darcy never found out, because he abruptly whirled away from her and stalked to the other side of the cell. Darcy breathed out a sigh of relief, her knees going weak for a moment. She was locked in a cell with a mad man. Provoking him was probably not in her best interest.**

 **Oh well. Here she went again. "Thanos and the Other tortured you," she told his back. "But that doesn't give you an excuse to take out your pain on us. You could have asked Thor for help. You didn't have to kill all those people."**

 **"** **As if their lives had any meaning," Loki snarled, turning around again. He didn't approach her this time, however. "As if any of them had any impact on the universe. I did your world a courtesy. Your precious humans are insignificant, ephemeral things, just waiting to be crushed out of existence."**

 **"** **If that were true then we wouldn't have been able to stop you," Darcy said.**

 **Loki came at her again but Darcy refused to let herself flinch. Once more he loomed over her, his face inches from her, but again he seemed reluctant to physically touch her.**

 **"** **Do you think that I am fool enough to let the Tesseract fall into the hands of Thanos?" he demanded. "Do you think that I** ** _ever_** **intended on letting his plans come to fruition?"**

 **Darcy stared at him, her mouth hanging open in shock. "You...** ** _let_** **the Avengers stop you?" she asked.**

 **Loki scoffed. "The Avengers. A farce to let your people think they are safe, to let them sleep at night. I am quite capable of out-thinking my brother and a handful of mortal clods."**

 **He seemed calmer when he turned away this time, clasping his hands behind his back as he paced away. Darcy slowly slid to the floor, heart pounding.**

 **"** **What?" she asked. "How… Why…" she was unable to finish any of her thoughts out loud. She stared at Loki. "You are one twisted son of a bitch," she finally said. "So what now? You're too proud to tell Odin and Thor the truth, so you're going to rot in this cell for the rest of your life?"**

 **He looked over his shoulder at her and smirked. "Oh, I have no intention of staying in this cell, little norn. In fact, I will not be staying in this cell for long at all."**

 **Darcy glared at him. "Yeah? How d'you figure that?"**

 **He pointed at her. "You are going to free me."**

 **She crossed her arms over her chest. "And why the hell would I do that? You may not have been working with Thanos, but you still killed a lot of humans. From where I sit, you deserve to be in here."**

 **"** **You will free me as your part of our bargain," Loki informed her smugly.**

 **"** **What bargain?" Darcy demanded.**

 **"** **I will teach you to use your powers, and you will assist me in getting free of this cell," Loki said, sitting on his couch and leaning forward, hands propped on his knees.**

 **Darcy eyed him. "Why, why, why, on all of God's green earth, would I let you teach me how to use my powers?"**

 **"** **Because I am the only one who has offered to do so," he replied.**

 **XxxXxxX**

 **Darcy clutched her Asgardian robe tight at her chest. Heimdall had given it to her the first day they'd gone into the city. It was deep emerald green, intricate knotted patterns woven into the soft fabric. It was loose enough to conceal her clothing and light enough to not be encumbering. She loved it, and kind of wished she could bring it with her back to Earth.**

 **She knew she was stalling, putting off the inevitable. She had known this day was coming for a long time, but she had always hoped that she could somehow avoid it. She had spun out a thousand different scenarios, and most of them ended with her in tears.**

 **She was lurking just outside the entrance to the Bifrost. It had finally been rebuilt, but over the last few weeks she'd been simply too busy to come see it. Jane had needed her in the lab for long hours, and her precious few hours of sleep had been needed for rest, not sight-seeing. Now that the analysis of the portal data was finally done, Darcy had a few days off while Jane considered SHIELD's offer to stay on permanently.**

 **Darcy peeked into the Bifrost chamber. Heimdall was waiting, his eyes fixed on something only he could see, his hands resting on the hilt of his sword in its stand on the dais. Then, at some unseen signal, he pressed the sword down. Darcy stepped away from the chamber as it activated, the wind of its movement fluttering her robe around her body. She held her hair back from her face with one hand and waited.**

 **A pillar of rainbow-colored energy pierced the darkness of the space beyond the Bifrost and slammed into the chamber with enough force to shake the ground beneath Darcy's feet, connecting the bridge. She waited until the chamber stopped spinning before looking in again.**

 **She recognized the others from New Mexico. She'd been briefly introduced, but she knew them now by reputation, and knew each of their names. Sif, Fandral, Volstagg, Hogun. Thor's friends and battle brothers. She didn't try to read them, she respected their privacy, but she focused on the figure in the center, with the mane of disheveled golden hair and a billowing red cape.**

 **Thor.**

 **Darcy took a deep breath and stepped into the chamber. Thor had his back to her, speaking to Heimdall. Heimdall saw Darcy and gave her an infinitesimal nod of acknowledgment. She folded her hands in front of her and waited. None of the others noticed or recognized her. In her robe, with her hair loose, and no glasses, she looked no different than any other citizen of Asgard, albeit a little bit shorter.**

 **"** **There is someone here to see you," Heimdall told Thor, gesturing past the prince. Thor turned sharply, a curious frown stamped on his features. The frown grew into confusion.**

 **"** **Darcy?" he asked in disbelief. He strode off the dais towards her. She waved awkwardly.**

 **"** **Hi," she said, trying bravely to smile.**

 **"** **How did you come to be here?" Thor demanded.**

 **Darcy gestured vaguely and then shrugged. "I...There's something I've gotta tell you. Can we talk in private?"**

 **Thor glanced around before focusing on her face again. "Is Jane here?" he asked quietly.**

 **Darcy shook her head. "She doesn't know I'm here," she told him. She caught the look of disappointment that flashed across his face but he hid it well. He switched Mjolnir to his other hand and offered her his arm.**

 **"** **If you desire to speak in private, I would be honored to escort you to the palace," he told her gravel.**

 **Darcy managed the smile and tucked her hand into his elbow.**

 **"** **Go ahead of me, my friends," Thor called to the others. "I have business to attend to."**

 **"** **It cannot be truly business if it involves such a beautiful maiden," Fandral said, coming over and bowing deeply. He tried to catch Darcy's free hand but she hid it behind her back.**

 **"** **Get on with you, scoundrel," Thor said, pushing him gently away. "The lady is a friend, not one of your conquests."**

 **Sif came over and seized the back of Fandral's collar. easily dragging him along with her. "Pay him no mind, my lady," she told Darcy. "He knows not how to mind his tongue."**

 **Darcy realized that Thor's friends had no idea who she was. They had no reason to suspect that she was Midgardian, or anything out of the ordinary. "I don't mind," she assured Sif. "I've known lots of men like him. He doesn't bother me."**

 **"** **Come along with you," Volstagg boomed, helping Sif drag Fandral away. "The kitchen's await us! We will feast!" Hogun trailed along behind them with an amused smile, nodding to Thor as he passed.**

 **Thor set off along the bridge at a much slower pace, more suited to Darcy's significantly smaller stature. "Did Heimdall bring you to Asgard?" he asked after a moment.**

 **"** **No, I came here myself," Darcy told him. She was making an effort to speak English so as not to give away the game early, and the concentration required was giving her a mild headache.**

 **Thor frowned at her again. "How is that possible?"**

 **Darcy took another deep breath. "Because I'm not human. Technically. I might be, I'm not certain, but I've got...powers."**

 **Thor stopped in his tracks, turning to face her. "Powers," he repeated. "Of what kind?"**

 **Darcy tilted her head up and looked him square in the eyes. "I'm a norn," she told him flatly.**

 **Thor went very still, his expression unreadable. He slowly unengaged his arm from hers and stepped back, then bowed respectfully to her. "My lady, I did not know. I beg your pardon if my conduct was too familiar."**

 **Darcy blushed deeply and pressed her hands to her cheeks to hide her embarrassment. "God, no, Thor, don't do that. I'm still me. I'm still just Darcy. I didn't even know I was a norn until after you came to Earth. I'm still trying to figure everything out."**

 **Thor straightened and peered down at her curiously. "How did you not know you are a norn? The norns are eternal, guardians of the wisdom of the universe."**

 **"** **Well, I'm special," Darcy said with a shrug. "I was born on Earth twenty-two years ago just like every other human. I was eight before I noticed I was different, and I was twelve when I first came here." She gestured around them. "I can dream-walk," she explained quickly.**

 **Thor rubbed his chin in thought. "If I had not had my strength diminished when we saw each other last, I would have recognized you," he told her.**

 **"** **You actually helped me realize what I was," Darcy told him. "Before you crash landed into our corner of the desert, I had no proof that I wasn't just bug nuts."**

 **"** **And you have not told Jane?" Thor asked.**

 **Darcy shook her head. "There's only a handful of people who know what I can do, and an even smaller handful who know what I am. It's pretty much Heimdall, you, and Lady Frigga." She purposefully left out Loki. She could guess what Thor's reaction would be if he knew Darcy was visiting his adopted brother.**

 **Thor's eyebrows jumped up his forehead. "Lady Frigga? You are known to her?"**

 **"** **We talk sometimes, why?" Darcy asked, suddenly nervous.**

 **Thor chuckled. "She is my mother."**

 **Darcy's mouth dropped open. "Lady Frigga...is your** ** _mother_** **?" she squeaked. "She's the** ** _queen of Asgard_** **? Holy crap!"**

 **Thor laughed again. "Did she not tell you this? She must have had her reasons."**

 **"** **I can't believe I got psychic lessons from the queen of freakin' Asgard," Darcy said weakly. She slapped her hand over her face. "Oh, my God, she saw me drunk."**

 **Thor clasped her on the shoulder. "Trust me, my friend. She has seen me do far worse."**

 **Darcy peeked at him through her fingers. "Intrigued. Do go on."**

 **Thor shook his head. "Another time, perhaps. Tell me, Darcy, why did you come to me now?"**

 **Darcy lowered her hand. "I need your advice. And I can't talk to Jane because doesn't know about what I am, and I can't go to Heimdall because he told me I had to figure things out for myself...and now I** ** _know_** **I can't go to Lady Frigga because she is your flipping** ** _mother…_** **"** **She shrugged. "You're all I've got left, buddy."**

 **Thor squeezed her shoulder. "Ask. I will help you in any way I can."**

 **Darcy wrung her hands together as she spoke. "I have this feeling...like something bad is going to happen. And I want to be able to stop it, but I don't know if I can, not know. And, I have the chance to learn more about my powers, but I have to compromise, like, a lot, in order to do it. But if I don't get stronger, someone I really, really care about could get hurt. Maybe die."**

 **Thor studied her for a long moment. "You are speaking of Jane, are you not?"**

 **Darcy nodded miserably. "I had a dream about her dying. Except it wasn't a dream, it was more like a memory...of the future. I can't let anything happen to her, Thor. She's my best friend."**

 **Thor shifted his weight and hefted Mjolnir in his hand as he thought. She knew he was divided between his sense of morals and his feelings for Jane. That was why she had come to him, of all people. He would understand her need to protect Jane.**

 **"** **Do you feel you must compromise yourself to a degree you would lose yourself?" he asked.**

 **Darcy thought hard about that. "I could keep myself...myself, I think. But I might have to do something I might regret."**

 **"** **Would it be worth it?" Thor asked her. "To save Jane?"**

 **"** **Yes," Darcy said without hesitating.**

 **Thor nodded slowly. "Then I would do anything I could to save someone I loved."**

 **Darcy nodded back. "Okay," she said slowly. "Thanks."**

 **"** **Darcy," Thor said. "This...dream of yours. If this day comes, and Jane is in danger, you will get word to me, yes?"**

 **Darcy reached out with both hands and laid them on his arm. "Trust me, big guy. If anything happens to Jane, I will drag your ass to Earth myself."**

 **"** **Are you capable of that?" Thor asked curiously.**

 **"** **I have no idea," Darcy said honestly. "But I will try my damndest."**

 **Thor tilted his head at her. "Why have you not told Jane what you are?"**

 **Darcy waved a hand in front her face. "Dude. Even I don't know everything that's going on with this. I say 'norn' and that means something to you, but you know more about them than I do, and Jane knows even less."**

 **"** **She would want to understand," Thor told her. "She would try to understand."**

 **"** **I want to wait until** ** _I_** **understand," Darcy said. "I don't have anything to give her right now except 'surprise! Homechick's got wacky powers!' and Jane deserves more than that."**

 **"** **You are frightened of what she might say," Thor observed.**

 **"** **I was scared of what** ** _you_** **might say," she admitted.**

 **Thor shrugged. "The ways of the norns are inscrutable to us. Whatever your will, it is my duty to accept it."**

 **Darcy gave him an uneasy look. "Yeah. Don't ever say anything like that again. It's damn creepy. Just, let's keep this on the DL until I give the thumbs up, okay?"**

 **He raised his eyebrows at her. "I understand your meaning, but not your words. I will honor your wishes, my friend."**

 **Darcy relaxed. "Thanks, big guy. You're the best."**

 **Thor gestured at the city in the near distance. "We will be celebrating our return. You are welcome to join us."**

 **Darcy smiled and shook her head. "Thanks," she said again, "But I've got to get back. My alarm clock's gonna go off in, like, two hours, and I'd like to get at least a teensy bit of sleep before Jane rises from the dead and starts demanding brains."**

 **Thor frowned at her. "Brains?" he echoed uncertainly.**

 **"** **Yeah, you know, zombie?" Darcy blinked at him. "Jane's not really a morning person. Mental note, next time you come to Earth we are marathoning** ** _The Walking Dead_** **."**

 **Thor nodded slowly. "I will await it with much anticipation."**

 **Darcy grinned at him. "Awesome. I'm gonna go now, but do me a favor and give my robe back to Heimdall. He knows where to keep it."**

 **Thor nodded again. "It was a great pleasure to see you again, Darcy."**

 **She impulsively lunged forward and hugged him. "You too, Thor."**

 **XxxXxxX**

 **The dungeons were still and silent as Darcy padded on bare feet down the corridor. She still didn't know how to enter or exit the dungeons from the palace, but that was the advantage of dream-walking: it occasionally offered shortcuts.**

 **Less than half of the cells were filled as she passed them, but their occupants were asleep or pacing listlessly, as if some kind of external force fostered a widespread sense of ennui. Whatever the cause, Loki seemed immune, because he was, as usual, reading with intense interest as she arrived. She recognized the book in his hands. It was the red and gold one Frigga had shown her, the one about norns.**

 **He looked up when she stopped on the other side of the barrier, setting the book aside as he rose smoothly to his feet. "Hello, little norn," he said with a knife-edge smile, coming to stand in front of her. "Have you thought on my offer?"**

 **** **Darcy took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. Then, before she could talk herself out of it, she said, "All right. I'm in."**


	5. A Vision With Nowhere To Go

Loki's smile grew sharper and he leaned forward, the golden barrier thickening in response. "I knew you would come around to my way of thinking," he told her.

"Don't flatter yourself," Darcy snapped at him. "You're a desperate means to an end."

"Desperation is a powerful motivator," Loki agreed. "So, little norn. Now that our bargain is struck, do I at least get to know your name?"

She crossed her arms. "Darcy," she replied reluctantly.

His expressions shifted. "That is not your true name," he observed.

"It's the only one you're getting," Darcy said.

"It's not wise to conceal information from your tutor," he said.

"Yeah, well, it's also not wise to trust a mass-murdering psychopath, either," Darcy told him.

"Oh, I would strongly advise against trusting me," Loki agreed. "You are far too intelligent to make that mistake."

Darcy frowned. "Thank...you?" she said uncertainly.

Loki backed away from the forcefield and gestured. "I am not going to teach you from there. Come inside."

She scowled. "I can't."

"You had no trouble before," Loki pointed out.

"I can't always control where I end up when I dreamwalk," Darcy told him, annoyed. "And I can't just hop from place to place _while_ I'm dreamwalking."

He tilted his head. "How do you have so much power yet so little control?"

"Because I've been trying to figure all this out on my own," Darcy spat. "I didn't have anyone to teach me, okay? I didn't even know I was a norn until last year, and I still don't even know what exactly a norn _does_."

"The norns are eternal," Loki told her. "They guard the secrets of the universe."

"But what does that _mean_?" Darcy burst out. "In practical terms, what does that mean for _me_?"

"It means, Darcy, that the fate of the universe quite literally rests in your hands."

Darcy blinked at him a few times and then sighed. "Great. So no pressure."

Loki clasped his hands behind his back. "The secret to all control is discipline," he said briskly. "You have no discipline, so you have no control."

"Gee, thanks," Darcy snarked. Loki levelled a flat look at her.

"I cannot teach you if you are not receptive," he told her.

Darcy uncrossed her arms and frowned. "Okay," she said. "Discipline. Go on."

"Discipline must rule all aspects of your life to be truly effective," Loki said. "Your waking life; is it orderly?"

"Orderly?" Darcy echoed, and rubbed the side of her nose. "Not exactly."

"Make it so," Loki instructed. "Eat and sleep regularly, at the same times each day. Set aside time for exercise and meditation."

"Meditation?" Darcy repeated.

Loki gave her another flat look. "Your mind is your greatest tool, and your greatest enemy. Some say that true power comes from the heart. They are wrong. All power comes from the mind. You must have complete control over your thoughts if you are to control your powers. If you need instruction on how to meditate, I will provide it. Do you have any combat training?"

Darcy stared at him blankly. "...No," she said at length. "I'm in Poli Sci, not the army."

"Combat training offers discipline of the body as well as the mind," Loki told her. "You will need to begin that, as well. Human combat skills leave much to be desired, but it will be a start. I will instruct you in that, also."

Darcy sighed heavily. "Okay. So do I get a lesson plan, or something?"

"Set your waking hours in order," Loki said. "That is your first lesson. If you must, write down your daily tasks. Complete them in a timely manner. Return here when you have done so."

Darcy rolled her eyes. "Awesome. Thanks a lot. I didn't realize all I needed was a life coach."

"You accepted my offer," Loki reminded her. "If you truly wish to master your power, you will follow my instructions."

"Fine!" Darcy said, throwing up her hands. She checked her watch. "It's almost seven o'clock. I gotta go. Ja-my boss is gonna wake up any minute and she needs coffee first thing."

Loki dismissed her with a wave. "Remember what I have said. Discipline."

"Yeah, yeah, Darcy muttered. "Discipline."

Darcy opened her eyes a second before the alarm on her phone went off, and she rolled over to shut it off. "I'm really gonna do this," she whispered to herself. But the images of her dream-prophecy-were still vivid in her mind. She was not going to let anything happen to Jane on her watch.

Darcy hauled herself out of bed and took an I-overslept-and-am-already-fifteen-minutes-late-for-class shower before heading into the kitchen. Jane was poking random buttons on the coffee machine, trying to get it to dispense coffee, and Darcy shooed her out of the way.

"Three degrees and you can't work a friggin' Keurig," Darcy muttered, fixing Jane's coffee and placing it into her hands. "Okay, listen up, Janey, 'cause we're gonna make some changes around here."

Jane shook her head. "Not before coffee," she protested, shuffling over to the pantry and digging out a package of poptarts. Darcy gingerly took them away from her.

"How the hell did these get in here?" Darcy demanded, eying the silver foil package as if it were toxic. "This is a Kosher household."

Jane looked guilty. "I may have requested them," she said.

Darcy glared at Jane and tossed the poptarts into the trash. "Kosher. Household." Darcy shuddered and wiped her hands on her pants. "And that brings me to my first subject. No more skipping meals and no more eating out of a package. We are going to have regular meals of real food."

"Our schedule doesn't always allow for that, Darce," Jane said, looking wistfully at the trashcan. Darcy shook her head as she opened the refrigerator door.

"We'll make it allow it. Meat or dairy?"

Jane thought for a moment. "Dairy."

Darcy began pulling out the ingredients she needed. "You are going to kill yourself if you keep going the way you have been. Now that we work for SHIELD, we're gonna actually get your life into some semblance of order, which means regular mealtimes, and honest-to-god work hours."

Jane stared at Darcy, clutching her coffee mug with both hands. "Where is this coming from all of the sudden?" she demanded.

Darcy waved a wooden spoon. "SHIELD offered me a salary," she explained, only half a lie. "If I'm gonna be paid to be your personal assistant, I'm gonna start acting like one."

Jane's eyebrows shot up. "SHIELD is paying you?" she asked, surprised. Then her expression turned to horror. "Oh, my god. When did your internship end?"

"Nine months ago," Darcy told her.

"Oh, my god, Darcy! Why didn't you say anything?"

"I was having fun."

"But your classes!"

"Online courses," Darcy told her. "I have nine more credits until I graduate. How awesome is that?"

Jane shook her head. "I can't believe you didn't say anything."

"Jane. Stop it. I _like_ working for you. I stayed because I wanted to. Besides, I was getting free room and board. A salary is just bonus. And this is off topic. Back to work hours. Because I'm feeling generous, I'm gonna allow you ten hours a day in the lab. Twelve if you have a breakthrough I deem worthy. Oh, and we're gonna start exercising. SHIELD has, like, twelve gyms in the Triskelion and we're gonna use them."

Darcy stirred the blintz batter a few times. "How do you feel about martial arts?" she asked.

"What?" Jane demanded, staring at Darcy in disbelief.

"SHIELD offers self-defense classes for civilian employees," Darcy told her. "I think we should take them."

Jane sat down at the table with a morose sigh. "If this is what you're like when you're officially working for me, you're fired," she said grumpily.

Darcy shook her spoon at her friend. "Too late. You're stuck with me. Besides, you love my challah bread pudding."

"Yeah," Jane agreed. She took a sip of her coffee. "I might keep you around just for that."

"Oh, and I need some time off next month. Just a couple of days."

"Sure. Why?" Jane asked curiously.

"Yom Kippur," Darcy told her. "Mom wants me to go back to Philly. She doesn't trust me to observe it on my own."

"Oh," Jane said. "That's the big holiday, right?"

"Yup," Darcy nodded. "Mom's always insisted we observe it as a family."

"Okay, yeah, take whatever time you need," Jane said. "Apparently I owe you nine months worth of back vacation."

"I'll take it up with SHIELD," Darcy said, pouring batter into a frying pan. "And you're distracting me again. We're really going to do this, Janey."

"You know I did just fine before I met you, right?" Jane asked, scowling at Darcy. Darcy flipped the blintz.

"No, you didn't," she replied. "Do you want raisins or figs in your blintzes?"

"We have figs?" Jane asked, perking up.

"Easily distracted by food," Darcy observed. "I'm gonna have to keep that in mind next time I need you to agree to something."

It took Darcy the rest of the day nagging at Jane before Jane finally relented. Darcy figured that if she had to bring discipline into her life, she might as well drag Jane along for the ride. Besides, she was serious about Jane working herself to death. The woman acted like she was the Terminator and then wondered why she would crash without warning.

So Darcy took Loki's advice and drew up a schedule, outlining the times they would wake up, eat, exercise, and work. She enrolled them both in SHIELD's self-defense classes and wasn't sure if she should feel excitement or apprehension when she saw that Natasha was one of the instructors.

She dragged Jane out of the lab at noon for lunch. "We'll eat from the cafeteria," she told Jane. "It's your one chance to get non-Kosher food, so you better take advantage of it."

Jane dragged her feet at all of Darcy's new changes but Darcy, when she was in the mood, was implacable, and Jane had become so used to Darcy's presence that she could no longer fully function without Darcy's assistance. That, and Darcy changed all the passwords to Jane's lab computers and refused to give Jane the passwords until she agreed to Darcy's plans. Hey, when logic failed, blackmail worked, right?

That night Darcy did her best to arrive in the dungeons when she fell asleep, and was pleased to find her aim had been halfway decent. She had been smart and wore real clothes to bed, so she felt less vulnerable. She could use all the confidence boosting she could get.

Loki was doing...something...when she arrived. He sat at a small desk in the corner of his cell, bent over with a tiny scalpel-like knife in his hand. Darcy couldn't see what he was working on, but every once in awhile he would blow away shavings and brush his workspace clean.

"Yo," Darcy said, rapping her knuckles on the stone frame of the cell. "Ice-man."

Loki stopped his work and looked around at her, raising his eyebrows. "What did you call me?"

"Ice-man," Darcy repeated. "You know: cold, unfeeling, and compassionless. Or did you think I was talking about the fact you're a Frost Giant?"

He put down the knife and stood, walking over towards her. "You are attempting to provoke me," he observed. "You feel threatened, so you attack first, hoping to put me on the defensive. It's an admirable tactic, if I were an imbecile."

"Great, so now we're psychoanalyzing all of our conversations?" Darcy asked, crossing her arms, and then uncrossing them, not wanting to seem defensive, the way he had pointed out.

"If you are to be my student, I expect excellence in all things, include verbal riposte," he replied.

"Fine, I'll join the SHIELD debate club," Darcy said sarcastically. "Look, I did what you told me. I put my life in order. Wrote up a schedule and everything."

"See that you follow it," Loki said.

"I will. Now how long until you start teaching me how to use my powers?" Darcy demanded, setting her hands on her hips.

He gave her a significant look. "What do you think I am doing?"

"I think you are trying to take control over my entire life," Darcy said. She jabbed her finger at him. "You just want me under your thumb so you can have control over a norn."

"And what control could I possibly have over you, from this cell?" Loki asked, spreading his arms to his sides. "I am, as you can see, a prisoner here."

"You've already told me you don't think I'm an idiot," Darcy said, shaking her head at him. "So please don't patronize me like that. We both know your power is in your words, not where you are. You know you are the only one who's been willing to help me and you're holding that over me. Don't think I don't know that. But that's not how this is going to go."

"Oh?" Loki asked. "Is that so?"

Darcy jabbed her finger at him again. "You want out of that cell. I'm you're one shot at that. But you, however, are not _my_ only option."

"Pray tell," Loki said, gesturing theatrically.

"According to Heimdall, I can learn my powers on my own. You are not necessary."

"But I _am_ your fastest means to that end," Loki taunted her. "And you are desperate, are you not? You are not one to wait on others to get what you want."

"No, I don't," Darcy told him. "I'm a norn. I don't have to."

Loki abruptly smiled triumphantly. "Yes," he said softly. "That. That is what I have been waiting for."

Darcy eyed him, suddenly nervous. "Ooookay?" she asked slowly.

"The norns are implacable," Loki told her. "They are enactors of Fate, of the Universe. They are not to be defied." He paced forward. "You are the greatest power in existence. You do not wait on the goodwill of others. You _take_ what you want and you make it your own."

Darcy stared at him, wide-eyed. "If you believe that," she asked softly. "Why are you helping me?"

"To have a norn in my good graces," he replied, his smile growing smug. "Well, that is a powerful thing."

Darcy took a full step backwards, unease pooling in her stomach. "I will not let you have power over me," she told him.

"Then we are at an impasse, my dear norn," Loki replied. "If you cannot give me what I want, I cannot assist you."

Darcy shook her head. "No. You don't get to say no." She stepped forward again. She took a deep breath. She didn't know for sure if she could do this, but if she could pull it off it would be incredibly impressive. She took another deep breath and held it, letting the world crystallize around her. She could see the pulse of the force field, see the frequency it vibrated at. To her sight it flickered in and out with each pulse, and she stepped through the gap, passing easily through the barrier.

Loki stepped back as she marched up to him and stuck her finger in his face.

"You are a lying, manipulating, selfish son of a bitch. I don't trust you as far as I can throw you, which believe me, buddy, ain't far. So if we're gonna do this, it's by _my_ rules. Got it?"

Loki stared down at her for a long time, his smirk wiped from his face. He took another step backward and bowed slightly, his upper body tilted forward. "Once again, I am at your mercy."

Darcy squared her shoulders. "You're damn right. Now where do we start?"

XxxXxxX

"Miss Lewis?"

Darcy blinked and came to herself. She was standing in the hallway of her apartment building, facing the door of the apartment she shared with Jane. Her keys were in her hand, as if she was in the act of opening or locking it, but she couldn't remember which. She realized that someone had called her name and she looked around.

Captain Rogers was standing a few paces away from her. He was wearing a brown leather jacket and jeans, his hair windblown. He carried a backpack over one shoulder; he clutched the strap with one hand and had the other shoved in his pocket.

"Are you alright, Miss Lewis?" he asked.

Darcy stared at him, her brain trying to find an explanation for what was happening at this moment and couldn't find one. "Are you stalking me?" she squinted up at him.

He frowned, looking suddenly nervous. "Uh...no. Why would you ask that?"

"Because you're in my apartment building," she said, blinking at him.

"This is _my_ apartment building," he replied, half turning away and then back. He shifted his weight uncomfortably. He gestured past her to the last door in the hallway. "I live in 14D."

Darcy shook her keyring at him. "Does SHIELD own this whole building?" she asked.

"I...don't know," Rogers replied. "You never answered my question."

"You asked a question?"

"Are you alright?" He enunciated each word carefully, to ensure she understood him.

"Yeah," Darcy said quickly shaking herself. "Yeah. Just, haven't slept in...you know what? I can't remember the last time I got a decent night's sleep."

Rogers frowned again, this time in concern. "Why's that?"

Darcy sighed. "Um, hang on a sec." She reached into the bag she was carrying and pulled out a tshirt. She sniffed it experimentally and made a face. "Okay. Definitely coming." She looked up and saw that the Captain was staring at her curiously. "Uh, dirty laundry. Coming back to the apartment to pick up new things."

"You are so tired that you couldn't remember if you were coming to your apartment or leaving?" he asked in disbelief.

Darcy grimaced. "Did I mention the fact I haven't been getting much sleep lately?" She unlocked the door and pushed it open. "Come on in. Can I get you a cup of coffee?"

"I don't think you need any coffee," he commented, but still followed her into the apartment. She dropped the bag in the entryway and headed straight to the kitchen. She turned on the Keurig and got two mugs out of the cabinet.

"Real or soy?" she asked, opening the refrigerator.

"I beg your pardon?" he asked, standing awkwardly in the middle of the kitchen.

"Milk," Darcy explained. "We have both. We're not lactose intolerant or anything, we just have both, you know, 'cause of, 'cause of…" she trailed off, staring at him blankly for a moment before finally finishing her sentence. "No dairy and meat," she said.

"You're Jewish?" he asked, more curious than surprised.

She nodded. "Real or soy?"

"Uh, real," he replied, and she got the bottle from the fridge and poured it into each mug before loading a kcup into the Keurig and punching the button to dispense the first cup. She placed it and the sugar bowl onto the table and made the second cup. Then she plopped down into one of the chairs at the table. She nodded at the chair across from her.

"Sit," she ordered.

Rogers obediently sat and reached for his cup of coffee. "So, you gonna tell me why you haven't been sleeping lately?" he asked.

Darcy propped her elbows on the table and stared at him over the rim for her mug. "You know how I can travel to places in my sleep?"

"That's what you told me," he replied, taking a sip from his cup. "Not really sure how it works, but I've seen the evidence, so…"

"I used to only do it sometimes," Darcy told him, and she was not about to shock a man from the Forties with the truth about the early patterns of her dream-walking. "And I'd have plenty of time to rest in between, but these days I'm doing it pretty much every night. And that means I'm not really sleeping anymore. So." She shrugged.

"Where do you go?" he asked, putting his cup aside and resting his forearms on the table. "When you travel. How do you do it?"

Darcy groaned and dropped her head between her arms. "Oh boy." She liked Captain Rogers. She really did. She didn't have to read him to know he was a Good Guy, capital letters and all. It wasn't a question of trusting him. She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt she could. The problem was more of _him_ trusting _her_.

She looked back up. "I don't know," she said honestly. "I've just been able to do it since I was thirteen. I used to not be able control it. It was a long time before I realized I was travelling, and not just crazy." She set down her cup and rubbed her nose. "But I've come to the realization that I may still be crazy."

"I don't think you're crazy," Rogers said, giving her a thoughtful look. "This world, this...place. A lot's happened. A lot's changed. And...I think it might be this world that's crazy, not you."

She gave him a small smile. "That's the nicest thing anyone's told me in a long time."

He shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. "It's just the way I see it," he muttered. "And you didn't really answer my question."

She tilted her head inquiringly at him. "There was a question?" she asked, half teasing.

"Where do you go?" he asked again, leaning forward. "When you travel?"

"I've only ever gone two places," Darcy told him. "New York City, just the once, and Asgard."

He blinked and straightened abruptly. " _Asgard_ ," he echoed. He placed his palms on the table and leaned back. "Asgard. Where Thor and Loki are from?"

"Yeah," she said with a tired smile. "One and the same."

He still stared at her. "How?" he asked again.

"Oh my _god_ ," she groaned. "You don't give up, do you?"

He snorted. "Not really."

Darcy threw her hands up with a resigned sigh. She was gonna have to tell someone human the whole truth eventually. She might as well practice on Captain America. "I'm not good at subtlety," she said. "So I'm just gonna come out with it. I'm a norn."

He frowned at her. "A norn?" he repeated.

Her face crumpled in disappointment. "You know, this went a lot better when I told Thor."

"You told Thor?" he asked. "When did you talk to him?"

She scrunched up her face as she thought. "Uh...few days ago. I think. What day is today?"

"Tuesday," he supplied.

Darcy nodded. "Yeah. Day before yesterday."

"In Asgard," he added. "Which you go to when you sleep. Because you're a...norn." He raised his eyebrow. "Okay. What is a norn?"

"Honestly, I don't really know," Darcy told him. "Everyone's been kinda vague. A couple of people have told me that norns are...sort of goddesses."

Rogers nodded slowly. "Goddess. Okay." He frowned. "Really?"

"I don't _know_ ," Darcy groaned in frustration. "I really don't know enough about it to tell you. I just know that norns are supposed to be these super-powerful, all-knowing beings and I'm...not." She hunched in defeat. "I don't know," she said again. "And I haven't slept in, like, a week. I'm having enough trouble putting a whole sentence together, much less figure out the age-old existential question of 'who am I?'"

Rogers shook his head. "You're exhausted. You need to sleep. This...this can wait." He stood up and crossed over to her, sliding her cup away from her. "Get some rest, Miss Lewis."

"Darcy," she corrected. "If you know my secret, you can call me Darcy, Captain Rogers."

"Only if you call me Steve," he insisted. He gestured at her. "Come on. I'm making sure you get some shut eye."

She giggled. "You gonna tuck me in?"

He colored pink up to the tips of his ears and stepped back. "I didn't mean, I'm not saying-"

She waved at him. "Joking. Joking. Really, though. I'm fine, I just need a shower and caffeine."

"No," Rogers-Steve-said. "You need real sleep."

"Jane's expecting me," Darcy protested.

"Well, then _she_ probably needs to get some sleep, too." Steve pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and tapped it a couple of times, squinting at the screen. Then he held it to his ear. "Hi, Natasha, can you find Dr Foster and make sure she gets back to her apartment? I have it on good authority she needs to get some sleep. No, Darcy's with me."

The tips of Steve's ears colored again and Darcy clamped her hand over her mouth to keep from giggling again. "Romanoff," Steve said warningly into the phone. "Just make sure she gets home." He tucked the phone back into his pocket and gave Darcy a look. "Time for you to hit the sack."

She saluted him mockingly. "Aye, aye. Can I get a shower first? Pretty sure I've been wearing this bra for the last three days."

"Geez, Miss-Darcy," Steve said, coloring a third time. "I don't, I really don't-"

She hauled herself to her feet. "You make this too easy. Shower, then sleep." She waved her hand around the kitchen. "Help yourself to whatever." She shuffled into the bathroom. When she emerged fifteen (maybe more like twenty) minutes later, he was sitting at the kitchen table, his coffee cup empty. He was reading a newspaper. Darcy didn't know where he'd gotten it. He folded it as soon as she stepped into the kitchen.

"All clean now," she said, tying off the braid she'd plaited her wet hair into.

"Natasha should be bringing Dr Foster back any minute," he said.

"You planning on babysitting us the whole time?" she asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Just until I'm sure you're both actually resting," he replied, returning her look.

"I am an adult, you know," she told him. "I don't need you to take care of me."

"There are times we all need someone to take care of us," he replied softly, his eyes dark and somber.

She was so tempted to read him, to reach out and snatch his secrets from his brain, but she held herself back. She had seen the damage that psychic trauma could cause. She wasn't about to risk inflicting that on someone else, even accidentally.

"Thanks," was all she said out loud.

The front door opened and Jane walked through, followed closely by Natasha. "...And my instruments are very sensitive, they require regular calibrations. If I'm not there to monitor them, the readings are going to be compromised!" Jane was protesting.

Darcy pointed at Jane and asked Natasha, "She been like this for long?"

"The whole way back," she replied, looking exasperated.

"You were in on this?" Jane demanded from Darcy. "She practically kidnapped me from my lab!" She then realized that Steve was in the room. "What is Captain America doing in our apartment?" she asked Darcy in a stage whisper.

"Apparently he's our neighbor," Darcy stage-whispered back.

"What?" Jane yelped, eyes snapping open.

"Yup," Darcy said, nodding.

"Bed, both of you," Natasha said, making shooing gestures at both of them. "The lab will still be there when you wake up."

"I can't believe you recruited _Captain America_ to your schemes," Jane accused Darcy.

"Actually I found her in the hallway," Steve said, getting to his feet. "She'd practically fallen asleep standing up. I think it took her about ten minutes to realize I was talking to her."

Darcy yawned abruptly, her jaw cracking. Natasha gave her a significant look. "Okay, okay," Darcy said, waving her hands in defeat. "Going to bed now. See, I'm going." She waved at them as she headed to her room, though she heard Jane start to make a new protest.

She managed to crawl under her covers before losing consciousness.

And almost as instantly found herself to be in Loki's cell.

"Son of a bitch," she groaned, and ground the heels of her hands against her eyes. She lowered them to find Loki watching her, eyebrow arched. "No," she said, holding up a hand. "I am exhausted and I haven't slept for weeks. I _can't_ handle anything more right now."

"It would not be wise to teach you anything in your state," Loki observed. "You would neither retain it, nor would it be beneficial to your health. Humans are delicate creatures, and your vessel _is_ unfortunately human."

"What, really?" Darcy asked, lowering her hand.

He gave her a look. "Did you expect me to tell you to push yourself beyond your limits? Only a foolish teacher demands more from their student then the student is capable." He gestured toward toward his narrow bed. "Rest. We will continue your lessons when you are stronger."

"Dude, I am not sleeping in your bed," Darcy said, shaking her head. Loki gave her another withering look.

"Truly, if I had plans to bring you to my bed, I would not be so obvious that you would be able to refuse me," he replied.

"That...that was smooth," Darcy admitted, and shuffled over to the bed and flopped onto it. There was a fur blanket at the foot of the bed and she pulled it up to her chin and closed her eyes. She abruptly opened them again. "What happens if I go to sleep while I'm dreamwalking?"

He smiled at her. "It's very simple, Lady Darcy. You dream."

Darcy frowned. The last time she had dreamed, it had been a prophecy of Jane's death. She didn't relish experiencing that again. "I don't want to dream," she said out loud. He picked up a chair and turned it towards her before sitting back down.

"You fear your dreams?" he asked.

"No," she said defensively. "I just do enough dreamwalking. I don't need to dream."

"Yes, I imagine it must be very taxing," he said flatly, and reached out to take a tiny silver vial from his desk. He handed it her. "Put a drop on your tongue."

Darcy held the vial in her hand for a moment "What is this?" she asked suspiciously.

"It will stop your dreams," he told her.

She looked at the vial and then back to him. "Why do you have this?" she asked blankly.

He gave her a long, level look, and it was the most honest thing she'd ever gotten from him. "Yeah," she said. "Okay." She unscrewed the top of the vial and tipped a drop into her mouth. It was sharp like peppermint and sweet like honey. She handed the vial back. "Thank you."

"I do not need your gratitude," he replied. "I need you to fulfill your end of our bargain, and I will do everything necessary to fulfill mine. Do not mistake that for kindness."

Darcy scowled at him. "Sure. Kill the moment. You're a jerk, you know that?"

"Guilty," he said, almost smirking. "Go to sleep, Lady Darcy."

 **"You're not the boss of me," Darcy mumbled, her eyes drifting shut.**


	6. Stay For As Long As You Have Time

It seemed that a good night's rest was exactly what Darcy needed because she woke up the next morning (in her own bed on Earth, thank goodness) feeling energized and more motivated than she had in weeks. Jane must have had similar results because she was actually alert before coffee.

Natasha had left a note on the kitchen table, telling them when she and Steve had left, assuring them that they had locked the front door, and Steve had scribbled his phone number at the bottom. Darcy waved the note in Jane's direction.

"Captain America gave me his phone number," she crowed.

Jane snatched the note and read it quickly. "This is addressed to both of us," she observed.

Darcy grabbed it back and took out her phone to program the number in. "Whatever. He still gave me his phone number."

"We should invite him over for dinner," Jane said. "You know, it's the neighborly thing to do. He probably doesn't have a lot of friends."

Darcy stopped with her phone in her hand. "Crap. You're right. He's been back for like, what, a couple of weeks? Damn. That can't be easy." She put her phone away. "Yeah. We should do dinner. D'you think he likes lamb?"

"Darce, sweetheart, _everybody_ likes your lamb," Jane assured her.

Darcy preened a little. "Okay. Awesome."

Erik had another appointment that morning, so Darcy dropped Jane off and picked Erik up from his quarters in the Triskelion. He was still under observation, so SHIELD was housing him on base.

Darcy excitedly told Erik about meeting Captain America and getting his phone number (leaving out certain details). "We're gonna invite him over for dinner. You wanna come?"

Erik nodded vaguely, his attention clearly elsewhere. "Yes, yes, that would be lovely."

Darcy peered closely up at the scientist. "Erik?" she asked. "Hey, you okay?"

"I wouldn't know, I don't go outside much," he replied, shuffling along with his eyes glazed over. Darcy reached out a hand and stopped him.

"Erik, look at me," she ordered. He stopped walking but didn't meet her gaze. "Erik, look at me," she repeated, letting a bit of the norn leak into her voice. He turned his head to obey.

Darcy hadn't read Erik since the Incident, since Loki, because she'd been afraid of what she might see. Now she peered deep into Erik's eyes, beyond them, and into his mind. It was a snarled, tangled mess, loose ends torn asunder and no longer connecting properly. It had nothing of the clear, crisp lines that she remembered from before, none of the sharp wit and lightning-fast leaps.

Tears pooled in Darcy's eyes and she looked away with a loud sniff, swiping the tears away. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I had no idea. I'm so sorry."

Erik frowned at her, seeing her for the first time. "Darcy?" he asked. "Why are you crying?"

"I'm not crying," she lied, clearing her throat. "I'm fine. What about you? Are you fine?"

"Yes," he replied, eying her curiously. "You're still crying."

"No I'm not," she lied again, swiping at her treacherous eyes again. "We're gonna be late for your appointment."

She hustled him down to his appointment and retreated to the nearest bathroom to collect her composure. She scrubbed at her eyes with a wad of toilet paper. Her mascara was a complete loss, but at least she would avoid having racoon eyes.

A loud crash from next door made her jump with a blurted curse. She frowned and looked around. She left the women's restroom and checked the hallway. The next room over was the men's room. She knocked on the door.

"Hello?" she called. "Is everyone okay?" There was no reply, so she pushed the door open. "Hello?" she called again. There was another bang, quieter this time. Darcy frowned again and reached out with all her senses. She didn't recognize the mind she encountered, but it had the same tangled, broken feeling as Erik's.

Darcy heaved a deep sigh and entered the men's room, passing the sinks. She looked around for a moment and saw Barton huddled in a corner by the stalls. His knees were drawn to his chest and his arms were circled protectively around his head.

Darcy edged closer, and then knelt on the tile floor. "Hey, Clint," she called softly. "You alright?"

He responded by drawing in tighter on himself with a short huff of air. Darcy sat back on her heels. "Oh, boy," she said to herself. "Clint, can you hear me?" she said. "It's Darcy. I'm right here. I'm not going to come any closer, but I want to make sure you're okay. Can you tell me you're okay?"

He didn't reply, and Darcy reached out towards his mind again. She didn't dare do more than read him with the lightest of touches. With the state of his mind, she didn't want to accidentally make him worse. She couldn't tell if he was aware of her presence, he was so wrapped up inside his own head.

Darcy pulled her phone out of her pocket and sent a quick text to Steve. She hoped someone had shown him how to text. She put her phone away and turned back to Clint.

"Clint, it's Darcy again. I need you to listen to me, okay? You're safe. You're in the Triskelion. Loki...Loki is far away. He can't hurt you anymore. Clint?"

It was like dragging her hands through broken glass. The sharp pieces of his mind cut her deeply, and tears started in her eyes again. How could she not have realized how badly damaged Clint and Erik were? She was a norn, she should have seen this much sooner.

Darcy sat cross-legged on the floor and propped her elbows on her knees. "Hey, I never told you the story of how I tased Thor, did I?" she asked. "So we were in the desert, right? Middle of New Mexico. Jane was chasing this celestial event so we were camped out waiting for it and then all of the sudden there was this rainbow tornado of doom. And Jane is all like, 'drive!' Right, so she wants me to drive right into this rainbow tornado. Uh-huh. Sure."

Darcy shifted uncomfortably. The tile was hard and her butt was already starting to go numb but she didn't get up or change position. "So we drive into the tornado, okay? And at the last minute Jane grabs the wheel and then all of the sudden, wham, we hit this guy. He'd come out of nowhere-we didn't see him or anything. And we all pile out of the van: me, Jane, and Erik, and run over to him. He's just flat on his back, right? And then Jane's all, 'Do me a favor, don't be dead.' Well, he's not dead."

Clint loosened from his huddle, his arms lowering enough for Darcy to see his eyes, which were now focused on her. She smiled and kept talking. "He gets up, right? And he's yelling all sorts of crap. 'What realm is this?' and 'Heimdall, open the Bifrost!' Totally freaking us out. So I whip out my taser 'cause who knows what this dude is gonna do? And he's all like, 'How dare you threaten Thor with so puny a weapon?' And I just hit him. Like, _wham_ , and he goes down, totally out. Which was a good thing, because we had to haul his ass to the hospital and there's no way we could have done that while he was awake."

She shifted again. "You know, he was kinda an asshole at first. But he got over it pretty quickly. I think we knocked some sense into him the second time we hit him with the monster."

The door opened quietly behind her, but she didn't look around until a hand gently touched her shoulder. It was Natasha. She crouched next to Darcy, giving the younger woman a quick nod. "Hey, Clint," she called. "You okay?"

He exhaled loudly. "...No," he said at length.

"You wanna tell me what's wrong?" Natasha prompted.

Clint grunted. "No," he said again.

"Okay," Natasha said. "You know where you are, right? Can you tell me where you are?"

There was a long pause, and then Clint said, "Not on the helicarrier?"

"That's right," Natasha said soothingly. "Not on the helicarrier. You're at the Triskelion, and you're safe. Can you say that for me?"

Clint grunted again, but obediently parroted her words. "At the Triskelion. Safe."

"That's right," Natasha repeated. "You're safe." She turned to Darcy. "I heard what you told him. You did good. That's what he needed. I can take it from here, if you want."

"Okay," Darcy said, and slowly got to her feet. She backed out of the bathroom to find Steve guarding the doorway. "Thanks for getting Natasha," she told him.

"How is he?" Steve asked, his hands in his pockets.

"He's rough, but Natasha knows what she's doing," Darcy said. She rubbed her eyes. "I can't believe I didn't see this before."

"How could you possibly have seen this?" Steve asked her.

Darcy groaned. "Dreamwalking isn't the only ability a norn has," she said. She dropped her hand and looked at him. "I'm kinda psychic, too."

He nodded slowly. "You can read minds," he said, sounding as if he wasn't sure he really believed her.

Darcy shook her head. "I can read _people_. I pick up on emotions, personality, bits of your past and future, defining characteristics, but not necessarily _thoughts_. I could tell that Erik and Clint were messed up by what Loki did to them, but I didn't realize…" she trailed off and pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'm such an idiot."

"This isn't your fault," Steve said dutifully.

She waved a hand at him. "No, not about that. I'm an idiot if I ever thought that-" she cut herself off abruptly before she could blurt out her secret. Steve had taken the truth well so far, but no way was she going to tell him she had made a deal with Loki. "Never mind," she muttered.

"Can I ask you a personal question?" Steve asked, tilting his head to look down at her.

She shrugged. "Sure."

"Are you human?"

Darcy snorted. "I get asked that a lot, believe it or not. And yes, as far as I know, I am. I am just also a norn, which is not human. I have no idea how I can be both. Still trying to figure things out."

He nodded again. "What else can you do?"

"Uh, I am the ultimate cat-whisperer. I can summon butterflies. I can do this weird thing with time where everything sorta slows down. I can predict the weather." Darcy thought for a moment. "And sometimes I can see the future. Sort of. Maybe." She shrugged a second time. "Like I said. Figuring things out."

Steve glanced at the door to the restroom. "Can you help Barton?" he asked quietly.

Darcy shook her head. "Not without his permission. He's had enough people messing with his head. I'm not going to go in there without his knowledge. And I can't go around telling people who I am and what I can do."

"Why did you tell me?" Steve asked.

She smiled ruefully. "Because I knew I could trust you. You know what it's like to have...abilities...you're not comfortable with, and you know how to keep a secret."

He grimaced. "Yeah," he said tightly.

Darcy gestured. "I gotta get back to Jane. I'll see you around."

He nodded. "Of course."

Darcy turned to go and then turned back. "Hey, Jane and I were thinking you might like to have dinner with us some night. You know, a neighbor thing."

He frowned. "That's...that's really… You don't have to do that."

"We want to," Darcy assured him. "Do you like red flannel stew?"

"Don't think I've ever had it," he admitted.

Darcy nodded decisively. "Good. I'll make red flannel stew with lamb. You'll love it. How about Tuesday night? Seven o'clock?"

He opened his mouth, closed it, and then nodded back. "That would be lovely, thank you, Darcy."

She smiled. "Awesome. See you then."

Darcy was quiet when she got back to Jane, and remained that way for the rest of the day, fuming in silence. Jane picked up on Darcy's mood but didn't press when Darcy refused to explain why she was upset. Jane didn't need to know about Erik and Clint's mental conditions. She had enough stuff to worry about.

Darcy continued to fume that night as she prepared dinner, and found she was too angry to sleep. After Jane went to bed Darcy aggressively cleaned the apartment, set two loaves of challah bread to rise, and tried to work on transcribing Jane's notes into the computer, but kept getting distracted on the last task.

With a defeated sigh, Darcy left her computer and stepped out onto the balcony, letting the tepid spring breeze ruffle her hair. DC was not very different from New York, it never truly slept, and even past midnight, the sound of traffic was still strong.

Darcy leaned her forearms against the railing and inhaled the smells of warm asphalt, car fumes, and stale water from the Potomac. "Heimdall," she said out loud. "I don't know if you're listening right now, but I need to get to Asgard, and I can't do it my way. So if you could help a sister out…"

There was no reply, even after she waited for several minutes. Darcy sighed again and dropped her head to her chest. "Son of a bitch," she muttered, and turned to go back inside.

A beam of energy slammed into her with enough force to knock her off her feet but she didn't fall, she was sucked upward so fast the breath was driven from her lungs. The energy surrounded her, cradled her, flashing in a myriad of colors. Through the beam of energy she could see stars flashing by, galaxies wheeling past her through the emptiness of space, and the only thing separating her from the void was the thin wall of the energy beam.

And then, almost too fast for her to realize what had happened, Darcy was standing in the Bifrost chamber, the walls slowing down from their spinning, while Heimdall stepped down from the dais.

"Welcome back, Darcy Lewis," he said, grinning at the stunned expression on her face.

"What. The. Hell," Darcy gasped, still frozen in place. She felt her hair and then patted herself down to make sure she was still in one piece.

"You _did_ request to come to Asgard," Heimdall reminded her.

"I asked you to help me _dreamwalk_ ," Darcy exclaimed. She turned around in a circle. It was cold in the Bifrost chamber, colder than she'd ever noticed. She had goosebumps. She could taste the salt on the air, sharp and bitter. Everything was so much more _real_ , more present, than she'd ever experienced before.

"This was more efficient," Heimdall said with a shrug.

"You sent a giant rainbow tornado to the middle of the city!" Darcy yelped. "People will have seen it! _SHIELD_ will have seen it!"

"Do you have no faith in me?" Heimdall grinned at her. "I can be subtle, when I choose to be. I assure you, no one will have observed your departure."

Darcy took a couple deep breaths to calm down. She looked around the Bifrost again. "Holy shit," she blurted. "I'm actually here, aren't I? I'm really in Asgard for real."

"Yes, you are," Heimdall told her. "It is far overdue, I think."

"Holy shit," Darcy said again, and looked down. "...Aaaand I'm wearing Star Wars pajamas," she observed morosely.

"It is my duty to be prepared at all times, Darcy Lewis," Heimdall chided her, and handed her the green robe he kept for her. Darcy took it gratefully and slipped it on, tying the sash.

"I need to get to the dungeons," Darcy said, pulling her hair free and taking off her glasses. She tucked them into her sash; she didn't actually need them, she just used them to throw people off.

"For what purpose?" Heimdall asked, frowning down at her.

"I need to punch Loki in his fucking face," Darcy growled, and stomped across the chamber towards the door. Heimdall caught up with her in a few strides.

"The Allfather has forbidden Loki any visitors," he warned her.

"Well, I keep hearing that the norns don't answer to nobody," Darcy retorted. "So I don't really give a damn. How do I get there from here?"

"I do not advise you to speak with Loki," Heimdall said, easily keeping pace with her as she stomped down the bridge toward the city. "He is crafty and has a way of twisting minds."

"Don't plan on speaking with him," Darcy replied. "Just punching. If you're not gonna show me where the dungeons are, don't bother coming with me."

Heimdall laid a hand on her shoulder, stopping her in her tracks. "Darcy Lewis," he said gravely. "Loki is dangerous. Were he to know there was a norn here, in a human body, he would find a way to use that to his advantage."

Darcy shrugged his hand away. "I can take care of myself, Heimdall," she said coldly. "Now show me the dungeons or leave me alone."

Heimdall sighed and pulled a golden disk out of a niche in his armor. He placed it in her palm. "This will guide you wherever you need to go. Simply speak your destination and it will show you the way."

Darcy stared down at the small device, caught slightly off guard. "Thanks," she said, and then looked up at him. "I mean it. Thank you, Heimdall."

He smiled sadly down at her. "I serve at the pleasure of the norns," he replied. He inclined his head towards her. "It is my pleasure to serve you, Darcy Lewis."

She smiled back at him, equally sadly. Then she held the disk out in front of her and spoke in a clear voice, "The dungeons." The image of a compass formed out of motes of golden light above the surface of the disk, the needle pointing straight for the city. Darcy took a deep breath and started walking.

It took her an hour to reach the palace. The compass led her through the palace corridors and down staircases until she reached a massive door guarded by two men in blue and gold armor. She slowed down as she approached them and they stared challengingly at her.

"Uh, hi," she said, still holding the compass in front of her. "I'm Dar-" She cut herself off. "I'm Lady Sigyn," she started again. "Heimdall gave me permission to get through here."

The guards looked at each other and back to her. "Only the Allfather can give leave to descend into the dungeons," one said, frowning. He gripped his spear a little tighter, and took a step towards her.

Darcy took a long step backwards. "What about Lady Frigga?" she asked quickly. "Lady Frigga said I could go anywhere in the palace I wanted."

The guard paused and gave her a closer look. "What is your name?" he asked.

"Uh...Darcy Lewis?" Darcy said uncertainly.

The guards exchanged another look, and then they turned to pull open the doors. "Be cautious," the first guard told her as she stepped through the doors. "It is easy to lose your way."

Darcy showed him the compass. "I'll be okay," she assured him.

However, as soon as she stepped through the doors, the image of the compass disappeared. She stared down at it, alarmed, and tapped the disk a couple of times. Then she looked up and realized the compass had completed its task by taking her to the dungeons. She held it to her mouth and whispered so the guards couldn't hear. "Loki's cell."

The compass appeared again, glowing comfortingly in the gloom of the dungeon corridor. She followed it quickly as it led her deeper into the labyrinth that was the dungeons, twisting and turning until she finally reached Loki's cell.

He was sitting at his desk again, working with the scalpel. He looked up when Darcy arrived, his expression almost brightening. Darcy shoved the compass into her sash and stepped through the barrier as easily as she had the last time. Loki rose to his feet to greet her, and Darcy punched him square in the nose.

He recoiled a step away from her, startled, hands coming up in a defensive pose, but he made no move to retaliate. Instead he simply stared at her. "Why did you do that?" he demanded, sounding almost hurt.

"Because I finally got the guts to see what you did to Erik and Clint," she told him through gritted teeth. She set her hands on her hips and squared off with him. "You _destroyed_ their minds," she accused him. "They will never be the same again, and it's _your fault_." She stepped forward and jabbed a finger into his chest. "You are a lying, manipulative, psychotic sack of shit. I can't believe I was ever stupid enough to think I could help you."

She jabbed his chest again, forcing him a step backwards. "You deserve to rot in this cell for the rest of your life and so help me I will make sure you do it."

His face darkened and he slapped her hand away. "We made a bargain, norn," he hissed at her.

"Well, I am _ending_ our bargain," she snapped back at him. "Don't forget, _I_ hold the power here, not you."

"You will never come into your full power without my instruction," he spat at her. "You're nothing but a puling mortal, grasping at things you can never understand. You will age and die long before you discover even a fraction of your abilities. You will be _nothing_."

Darcy stepped away from him. "I would rather be nothing than accept help from _you_ ," she sneered. She turned to leave and he grabbed her arm with terrible strength.

Darcy didn't pause to think. She pushed back with the arm he'd taken and swept it against his chest. Loki flew off his feet and landed hard on the floor, knocking over a chair and a table of books. He looked up at her from the floor, eyes wide in shock. Darcy glared back at him.

" _Never_ touch me without my permission, ever again," she said in a low, dangerous voice. She turned, keeping her head high, and stepped through the barrier once more, marching back the way she had come. As soon as she was out of sight of Loki's cell, she stopped and leaned against the wall.

"What the fuck?" she asked herself quietly, starting to hyperventilate. How the hell had she managed to knock a _Frost Giant_ on his ass? She hadn't even thought about it; she had just _reacted_. Did this mean she had super strength or something?

She rubbed her forehead, eyes squeezed shut. "I need a drink," she muttered. She pulled the disk out of her sash and stared at it for a moment. "Lady Frigga's sitting room," she instructed it. The compass appeared and spun around to point her way.

When Darcy arrived at the door to Lady Frigga's sitting room, the door was open. She poked her head inside but there was no one there. Cautiously, she edged inside and looked around. She turned the compass over in her hand. "I don't suppose _you_ know where Lady Frigga is," she muttered at it, slipping it back into her sash.

Darcy walked over to one of the couches and plopped down with a sigh, leaning forward to rest her head in her hands. She was tired again, despite having actually gotten a decent night's sleep the night before-thanks to Loki. She grimaced. Of all the bad decisions she had ever made, that one took the cake. She couldn't believe she was so blind that she actually went to _Loki_ for help. She could kick herself for decades and not be finished.

An Asgardian woman walked into the room and stopped abruptly at the sight of Darcy sitting on the couch. Darcy looked up and then jumped to her feet.

"Hi," she blurted. "I'm Darcy Lewis, and I'm looking for Lady Frigga. Do you know where she is?"

The woman gave Darcy an assessing look. "You are the norn girl," she observed, her forehead creased. "The human one." She said the word _human_ a bit more condescendingly than Darcy would have liked.

"Yeah, I am," Darcy said, raising her chin. "And I'd like to speak with Lady Frigga."

"I will let her know you are here," the Asgardian said, and swept off. Darcy rolled her eyes and plopped back down on the couch. A few minutes later, however, she popped back up when Lady Frigga entered the room.

"Darcy Lewis," the queen greeted. "It is a pleasure to see you again."

"Your Majesty," Darcy said, trying an awkward curtsy.

Lady Frigga frowned. "Who told you?" she asked. "I had hoped we could avoid such formality."

"Thor told me," Darcy replied, wringing her hands together nervously. "We-um-talked the other day."

"Come, child," Frigga invited, holding her hands out to Darcy. "I had no desire to intimidate you. That is why I did not tell you who I was. Do you resent me for it?"

"What? No!" Darcy exclaimed as Frigga took her hands and gently lowered her back to the couch. Frigga sat next to Darcy, close enough that their knees touched. "I don't resent you at all! I just...I just can't believe that you saw me drunk. It's humiliating."

"Child, I have seen my sons do far worse," Frigga reassured her. "You did nothing to cause me to lose respect for you."

"Thor mentioned that," Darcy said with a wry smile. "Care to share any stories?"

"Perhaps another time," Frigga said. "I can see you bear a heavy burden now. How can I help you?"

Darcy leaned forward, tightening her grip on Frigga's hands. "You showed me how to break a psychic connection. Can you show me how to heal someone from psychic trauma?"

Frigga tilted her head and gave Darcy a searching look. "Breaking a psychic bond and healing psychic wounds take different abilities, Darcy Lewis," she told Darcy. "Having the power for one does not mean you have the power for the other."

"Oh," Darcy said, wilting a little.

Frigga released one of Darcy's hands and reached upwards towards Darcy's face. "If I have your leave," she said, pausing with her fingers a few inches from Darcy's cheek. Darcy nodded and Frigga placed her hand on Darcy's face, cupping her cheek in her palm.

Darcy felt Frigga in her mind like a warm presence, a mother's comforting touch. Frigga was gentle and kind and reassuring; everything Darcy wished she could be. After a moment Frigga withdrew both her hand and her presence in Darcy's mind, and Darcy was almost disappointed to feel her leave.

"You have great power in you, child," Frigga told her. "But I do not sense the ability to heal. The norns are not known for their acts of kindness."

Darcy sat back, withdrawing her other hand from Frigga's grasp. The disappointment was sharp and cut deep. For so long she had had people tell her that she had power that she had become accustomed to it. She was not used to people telling her what she _couldn't_ do.

"I see that was not the answer you sought," Frigga said. "People you care about have been hurt, I think?"

"By Loki," Darcy said boldly, meeting Frigga's gaze. "He controlled their minds, took away their free will, and it destroyed them. They-they're never going to be the same again. Their minds...they're like broken glass, all sharp pieces. It hurt me just reading them. I can't imagine what it's like for them…"

Frigga looked down, her expression sorrowful. "Loki's crimes are great," she said softly. "It seems we will spend many years recovering from them." She looked up again. "Can you bring these people here, to Asgard?"

Darcy's eyes widened. "What?" she asked flatly. "Bring them here? Uh...I don't know...I can't…" She thought about it for a long moment. "No," she finally said reluctantly. "There's no way I could get them here without telling them who I am. _What_ I am."

Frigga frowned at her. "Why can you not tell them?" she asked.

"Because if SHIELD found out what I can do, they would go ballistic," Darcy told her. "After everything that's happened, with Loki, and the Chitauri, they'd label me a threat and lock me up. Probably try to study my brain or something. I can't risk it."

Frigga continued to frown. "You are a norn, Darcy Lewis. There is certainly no human that could stand against you."

Darcy rubbed her forehead. "I think you guys keep forgetting that _I_ am human, too. I live on earth. I have to deal with humans and human things if I want to keep living on earth."

"Then do not live on earth."

Darcy went still, her body growing cold at Frigga's words. She weighed them carefully, repeated them in her head. _Do not live on earth_. She could do it. Heimdall would welcome her on Asgard, certainly, and she had a strong feeling Frigga would, too. She was a norn, after all. Or she could travel to the other realms, and look for the rest of the norns. They had to be out there somewhere; maybe they would teach her how to use her powers.

 _Do not live on earth_.

She would have to leave her parents. Her brothers. Jane. Everything she cared about, everything she had ever known. But she wouldn't have to hide anymore. Wouldn't have to lie to everyone about who she was, _what_ she was. She could, for the first time in her life, truly be herself.

 _Jane would die._

Before Darcy even finished considering Frigga's suggestion, she knew the truth of it. If she left earth, Jane would die. Whether by her dream, or some other way, it would come to pass. Darcy shook her head. Her freedom was not worth Jane's life, not now, not ever.

"I can't," was all she said out loud.

Frigga nodded slowly. "Then perhaps I can come to your friends."

"You would do that?" Darcy demanded, hope leaping into her voice.

"Anything that concerns a norn this greatly should be my highest priority," Frigga assured her. "Also, Loki is my son. If I cannot heal those he has hurt, who will?"

"That would be amazing, thank you!" Darcy burst out. Then she deflated. "How are we gonna pull that off, though? I mean, how are we gonna get you to earth and onto a SHIELD base without them knowing I told you?"

Frigga gave her a look. "Child, I am the queen of Asgard. I need no reason to visit earth, especially after what my son has done to your world, and I need no one's permission to visit this SHIELD of yours. From what Thor has told me, If I come to earth, SHIELD will be quite interested in _me_."

"Yeah they will," Darcy agreed. "They will lose their minds over you."

"Then it is settled," Frigga said, clapping her hands together. "I will visit your world in three day's time, and I will see to your injured friends."

"I really want to hug you right now," Darcy told her. "Would that be okay?"

Frigga smiled and held out her arms. "I would be honored."

Darcy lunged forward and wrapped Frigga into a tight, enthusiastic embrace, burying her face against Frigga's shoulder. "Thank you so much," she said softly. She leaned back and met Frigga's gaze again. "I have no idea how this is going to go, but thank you."

"It truly is my pleasure," Frigga assured her. She rose to her feet. "Now, is there anything else I can do for you? Will you stay and dine with us?"

Darcy checked her watch and grimaced. "I should get back before Jane wakes up and realizes I'm gone."

Frigga's face softened. "Ah. Yes. Thor has oft spoken about this Jane Foster."

Darcy hopped up. "She's the best. She's also my boss and she has no idea about what I am so…" she gestured around them. "Late night trips to Asgard? Needs to stay on the DL."

"Of course," Frigga said nodding. "Then I will not keep you. I will, however, see you in three day's time, as promised."

"I will owe you big time," Darcy said, fishing around in her sash for Heimdall's compass. "I can't thank you enough."

"You have already done far more for me than you know," Frigga told her quietly. Darcy gave her a puzzled look, unsure of her meaning.

"Okay," Darcy said when no further explanation was forthcoming. "I will see you later. Gotta get back to the Bifrost."

Frigga nodded again and Darcy saw herself out. She muttered to herself as she headed back to the Bifrost. When she finally arrived, she strode into the chamber while she undid the sash on her robe.

"Who decided it was a good idea to put the Bifrost on the ass-end of this planet?" Darcy demanded, slapping her glasses back on her face and bundling the robe up.

"Bor, the father of Odin," Heimdall replied, knowing a practical answer would only annoy her.

"Har har," she snarked, falling for his tactics. She handed him first the robe, and then the compass. "Thanks for this, by the way."

Heimdall handed the compass back to her. "Keep it. A memento of your first physical trip to Asgard."

Darcy closed her fingers over the metal disk. "Thanks," she said again, quieter this time. "I should get back."

Heimdall pointed at the other end of the chamber. "Stand there. When I give you the signal, step into the bridge."

The chamber began to spin and align, and then the energy beam blasted outward, piercing the darkness of the space beyond. At Heimdall's go-ahead, Darcy took a deep breath and stepped into it. It was partly like falling, partly like flying, hurtling along through space at unbelievable speed. She barely had time to take it all in before she was standing on the balcony of her apartment, trying to catch her breath.

She looked around. There were no telltale burn marks on the ground like she had seen in New Mexico, no indication whatsoever that she had been to and returned from Asgard. She looked around. The sun was just coming up over the horizon.

Jane opened the sliding door to the balcony, a coffee cup in one hand. She blinked blearily at Darcy. "What are you doing?" she asked, her voice thick with sleep.

"Nothing," Darcy said defensively. She looked around again. "Getting some fresh air?"

Jane grunted and shuffled away, leaving the door open. Darcy moved to follow her. "What do you want for breakfast?"


End file.
